To Be Invisible
by Vathara
Summary: Akira thought he was finally normal. He wasn't. The Tok'ra think they've finally cracked the invisibility problem. They didn't. And Shirogane is curious. This is never good.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Stargate SG-1/ Monochrome Factor. Neither is mine. Bunny bit when I read volume 2, was Jossed by 3; so it goes. So this is definitely AU for MF. "To not be seen, is to be invisible."

------------

Watching Shirogane's shadow-simulacrum of himself walk out of the bathroom to rejoin the tour in his stead, Akira knew he'd been had. Somehow. He just hadn't figured out how, yet. "Just what do you think they'll do when they figure out there are two of me? We can't stay in here forever!"

Shirogane chuckled.

Akira tried not to groan. Shirogane's chuckle was such a _cheerful _sound. Charming, to those who'd never met the shin before, and so had no idea how _utterly insane_ their lives were about to become.

_Ordinary, boring life_, Akira thought, valiantly restraining himself from banging his head against the wall. _Ordinary,_ boring _life…._

After all, that was what Shirogane had promised him months ago. Homurabi had been defeated, Shirogane had been restored to his rightful place in the shadow world, and Akira had finally - _gratefully_ - passed on Ryuko's inshi. Without dying in the process. Which was, apparently, a first.

Kou was already looking for the next heir, to swear allegiance to him; with Homurabi gone, he had all the time he needed to find the newest direct king of the rei, without worrying about the worlds going out of balance. Thank the gods. Akira didn't _want_ to be Kou's king. Or anyone's.

_I'm not Ryuko! I'm not anyone's reincarnation. I don't want power over the world. All I want to be, is me!_

And he could be. No more rents in the boundaries between light and dark meant no more waves of kokuchi swarming over, which meant no more need for Akira to be running around like a comic-book maniac fighting them. Oh, there were a few, now and then - but Kengo, Aya, and Kou gladly took care of those. Gleefully, even.

And why shouldn't they? They still had powers to stand against the shadow monsters. He was normal again. Human. Shirogane had _promised_.

Which still didn't, apparently, put him off-limits as far as getting dragged into Shirogane's schemes. He didn't know what the shin wanted here in NORAD, or why they were hiding out in the men's room instead of _back with the tour_, where he _belonged_ - but he was beginning to have deep, deep suspicions about exactly how his mother had won them both a paid vacation to America.

More accurately, he'd _started_ having suspicions the moment Shirogane had fallen into step with him just inside the gate, and they'd only worsened as the tour went on. Not that anyone _else_ knew they'd picked up an extra tourist. Outside of Akira - who was otherwise _normal_, thank you very much - no one else was unlucky enough to be able to see shin.

_Not unlucky. He's one of the few friends you have. _

Which wasn't always easy to remember, when you had to keep a straight face while the invisible-to-everyone-but-you shin flirted like a _fiend_.

Speaking of which… "If you say this was the only place you could get me alone, I'm walking out now." Which was cold, and Shirogane didn't deserve it. Much. "My mother and I will be here for a week. We can find plenty of places to talk after the tour. Away from the _soldiers with guns_."

"But isn't this more fun?" Shirogane winked at him, then sobered. Just a little. "Are you happy, Akira-kun?"

"…You have me hiding in the middle of an underground fortress to ask me _that?_"

"That, and other things," Shirogane said seriously. "Are you?"

_Pounding his head through a wall_ might _be overreacting. Maybe._ "Why shouldn't I be?" Akira said levelly. "Nothing's trying to kill me every night. No one has me involved in any more plots to destroy the world." _Or save it._ "Outside of seeing people like you, I'm normal. It's what my mother wants; a normal, ordinary son. It's what Kou wants; the chance to have someone worth being his king, not a… kid." _Kou's a fighter. Always has been. He doesn't deserve someone who always wants to run away from a real fight. Sure, I stopped running - but only because_ not_ running was the only way to keep them safe. To try, anyway._ "It's what everyone wants."

"Ah, but I'm selfish," Shirogane said softly. "I look at you, Akira-kun, and I can't think of what everyone else wants. I only think of what _you_ want." He leaned on his cane, vivid blue eyes unusually sober. "Are you happy?"

"I-" Wait. Something was wrong. Like pins and needles, prickling on his neck; a taste of sickness in the air.

_The boundary's been torn. _

Akira stared at his friend, heart beating faster. "There are kokuchi here."

"There are," the silver-haired shin agreed. "I could probably handle it on my own…."

"Probably?" Akira sputtered. "You're going to have to!"

"Am I?" Blue eyes were fathomless. Waiting.

Akira stifled a groan. "How many times do I have to say it? Shirogane, if you want me to trust you, _you have to explain_."

"Ah!" The shin brightened again. "Remember what I told you, the first night we met?"

"It has to be you?" Akira sighed, half resigned.

"No, no," Shirogane waved a gloved hand. "After that."

"A shin can't go back to being a human?" Akira guessed. "But that wasn't true-"

"Yes, it was."

It shook him. But- "I _passed on_ Ryuko's inshi!"

"Yes…."

"Which means I'm _not_ rei anymore. I'm not your counterpart - and I don't _have_ an inshi. Light _or_ dark."

"Well…." Shirogane looked mildly nervous. "Two out of three?"

"Explanation," Akira gritted out. "Now."

"Ah. Well, it's really quite remarkable; I don't think it's ever happened before-"

Akira gripped Shirogane's suit, glaring. "Stop stalling!"

"A shin has a dark inshi," Shirogane said simply. "You were a shin for months. By contract. With me. With all the exposure to the shadow world's power that implies. Couple that with royal blood, which you _still have_…. I think the energies coalesced into a new matrix, following the pattern you _should_ have had. In essence - you grew your own inshi, Akira."

"…." Nerveless fingers let cloth slip free. _Oh. No._

"I doubt anyone expected it," the silver-haired shin shrugged. And gave him a fond smile. "But it's there."

"You said I'd have an ordinary life!"

"And you have," Shirogane said seriously. "You still can. Five 'children' for each king, I told you - and the most powerful of those created usually _do_ number five. But there are many of lesser strength. Made, or born."

_Born?_

"Many shin - and rei, like Kou - fled Homurabi's conflict. And more fled others, in times past… how did you think you ended up with royal blood to begin with?" Shirogane looked sad. "I've no idea how many of them I may find. They sealed their own powers; they're almost human, while that stands. They can live that way, and they may die that way." A slight, wistful shrug. "I sealed yours, but the principle is the same. It's a defense, not a prison. It won't hold… if you wish it not to."

He didn't know what to feel. He didn't know what to _think_. "I'm still a shin."

"Under the seal, yes," Shirogane nodded.

"And something's tearing the boundary between the worlds."

"_Not_ a shin," Shirogane stated. "I've some ideas on what it may be, but I really don't know for sure."

"You don't know, but you're going in anyway," Akira said, resigned. "And you want my help."

"I would very much _like_ your help, Akira-kun." Shirogane gave him a quiet smile. "But if you're happy as you are…."

"You know I can't let you do this alone!" Akira said hotly.

The shin cocked his head, wide-brimmed hat dark over wistful eyes. "Do I?"

_Damn._ He was really going to do this. Walk back into the shadows, of his own will. _Knowing_ what he was up against. Because it was his friend… and not even Shirogane should face monsters alone.

Breathing in, Akira closed his eyes, and reached for shadows. _Doppler release!_

It was like fighting through mud, instead of the quicksilver tingle he remembered. It dragged at him. It _hurt_-

And then the pain was gone, flicked away like a feather, and there was a lightness in his limbs that made him want to laugh….

Until he saw the mirror.

_Breathe. You knew this would happen. _

Hair not brown, but dark as the shadow he no longer had; eyes washed from gray to a scarlet no one could mistake for human. He'd seen it before. But it was different, somehow.

Suspicious, he shot Shirogane a dark look.

"What?" Shirogane blinked innocently at him, silver braid flicking behind his shoulder.

"Now I _know_ you did something," Akira muttered, scooping the eerie shadow-doll of a doppleganger off the floor to tuck it into a pocket of his shin-form's sleeveless dark coat. He was going to need it, later.

"Well, yes," the shin admitted. "Your first contract was such a hasty affair. If you ever did decide to remove the seal… well, let's just say, I smoothed a few rough edges. In preparation."

Even half-sure it was coming, Akira couldn't dodge the kiss.

This one didn't change everything. Just… sparkled through him, blazing a faint trail in his mind to _elsewhere_.

"There's a reason I have trouble explaining." Shirogane winked, backing off. "Sometimes, I forget that I need to."

Elsewhere had - feelings. _Certainties_, about the shadows, of things he'd only guessed at before.

"Things work differently for shin," Shirogane murmured. "A long time ago… we built a sort of library. You may not have Ryuko's memories, but you'll learn how to use it. In time."

So. Not only had he stepped back into the shadows, but he stood a better than even chance of starting to be as irritatingly obscure as Shirogane. There was only one rational reaction.

_"Arrrgggghhhhhh!"_

------------

Heading for the down elevator to the SGC, Daniel Jackson jumped. "What was _that?_"

Coffee in hand, Jack O'Neill eyed him. "What was what?"

Daniel didn't quite roll his eyes. "That _yell_, Jack."

"_What_ yell?" the colonel said dryly.

The archaeologist was half-tempted to let it slide. But- No. "The last time I heard something like that, a professor had just figured out his shiny new Canadian Viking site had been planted by some undergrads who'd found a few antiques in their Icelandic grandfather's attic."

"That bad, huh?" Jack got into the elevator, frowning. "I didn't hear it."

_But he didn't say there wasn't anything_ to _hear_, Daniel thought, watching the doors close and the numbers start their steady descent. "So…?"

"I'll tell Security when we get down there," Jack allowed. "Could have just been someone having a really bad day."

_That you didn't hear?_ "So you don't think it's serious."

"In NORAD?" Jack said skeptically. "Now, if we'd been a few floors down…."

Okay, point. "People have been seeing things, Jack."

"What, ghosts?" The colonel rolled his eyes. "Hate to say it, but when enough people die in a base, you're bound to get ghost stories. Has anybody seen _anything_ they could prove?"

"Could anybody see the Reetou?" Daniel lobbed back.

"And, when we swept the supposed 'cold spot' with TERs, we got?" Jack eyed him.

"Nothing," Daniel admitted.

"Exactly. Besides. Carter says our snaky little buddies' invisibility prototype doesn't switch things out of phase with our reality, like the Reetou. More like, wads strings up into a ball, or something…."

"Accesses alternate dimensions predicted by string theory," Daniel said, keeping a straight face with an effort. He knew Jack understood technobabble better than that. The colonel just didn't want to admit it. Someone might make him write a formal report. Heaven forbid. "And I don't think Sam would like to hear you call Martouf a snaky little buddy."

"Yeah? What about Aldwin?"

"Um." Daniel shook his head, and gave Jack a look askance. Just because the Tok'ra had almost left them on Netu to blow up with Sokar, before Teal'c got in his way, that was no reason to be rude.

…Well, maybe just a little.

"What I don't get," Jack went on, scowling at the elevator doors, "is why they're testing this prototype here, where we _primitive_ Tau'ri can see it. And I _don't_ buy that 'we'd like to see Major Carter's energy readings from Nirrti' bit."

"Maybe the High Council finally read the definition of _alliance?_" Daniel suggested.

Jack eyed him.

Right. Not likely. "Maybe Martouf and Lantash just wanted to see Sam."

"Maybe," Jack allowed. Though he didn't look like he liked that option much better. "I just… don't like it."

"Which has _nothing_ to do with people swearing they see phantoms," Daniel observed, tongue in cheek.

"Ghosts. Right." Jack drained his coffee.

"No, phantoms. Or spectral recordings," Daniel corrected. "Nobody's actually said anything about seeing a person. Just cold spots, or shadows. In the current literature, that's usually not an actual spirit. More… recorded psychic impressions. Or so people think."

"The current literature?" Jack raised an eyebrow at him.

Teal'c did it better, but- "Pyramids built by aliens?" Daniel reminded him. "There are reputable, scientifically trained people out there who investigate fringe phenomena. Things most scientists won't touch with a hundred-page grant application. If people think they're seeing ghosts in the base… well, I thought I'd see what was out there, research-wise. There's some pretty interesting articles from Japan about a recent upswing in events that ended abruptly last year-"

Jack clapped a hand to his forehead in disbelief.

"You _asked_."

"One of these days, I'll learn." Jack shook his head as the doors opened onto the SGC. "C'mon, Danny. Let's go tell Security to look for a ghost having a _really_ bad day."

------------

Ducking into yet another janitor's closet, Akira wondered exactly how bad this day was going to get. "Do we _have_ to stop on every floor?"

"If we want to find all the holes, yes," Shirogane said simply.

"Not that!" Dropping the doppleganger to the floor, Akira stepped on it, and shook his head as his body grew heavy again. "What if they have a camera in one of these?" Not that it would record much, he belatedly noticed. No lights on.

Gods, he'd _missed_ that. Walking through Tokyo blind and helpless as any human, with the alleys truly _dark_ again - it hadn't felt normal anymore. Hadn't felt _right_.

"You need to be able to release the doppleganger to a specific location," Shirogane said pointedly. "Your pocket, for example. You can't count on always being able to pick it up after a fight."

"…Sometimes I hate it when you're right." _Doppler release!_

A foaming tingle, and the shadow fell away again, landing as an eerie black doll in his hand.

"Closer," Shirogane judged. And nodded.

Relieved, Akira tucked the doll back into his pocket. "What is this place, anyway?" He opened the door a crack and glanced around suspiciously, before they both slipped back into the hall. People might not see shin, but doors opening by themselves were quite another matter. "NORAD is supposed to be the Air Force. These people have all kinds of uniforms. And some of them don't have _any_."

"I don't know," Shirogane replied as they walked down the corridor, searching for any sense of shadows leaking into the world of light. "And that worries me."

When _Shirogane_ was worried, sane people headed for the hills. "But you know something."

"Memories are shadows, too." Blue eyes glanced at him. "When I say _Kemet_, what do you remember?"

_"Ye shall not bar the way for my soul, nor my shadow,"_ Akira murmured. _Wait._ "That wasn't Japanese…."

"No. That language has been lost a long time. To humans," Shirogane added. "The people of that land knew something of rei, and of shin. Soul and shadow, they called us, and knew we were part of each other. Though luckily, they didn't know much more."

"Luckily?" Akira repeated uneasily.

"A long time ago, a great evil came to the world of light," the silver-haired shin said soberly. "We fought it, as did the humans. And eventually, the gate was shut."

_Why do I_ know _where this is going?_ "You think someone's opened it," Akira sighed.

"I _know_ someone has," Shirogane corrected him. "At least three years ago; dealing with Homurabi kept me from coming earlier. What I don't know is what has come through. Or why the shadows are being breached now; that evil knew nothing of rei, or of shin, or we all might have perished."

_Very, very bad._ "Does this evil have a name?" Akira asked.

"They called themselves gods."

Akira gulped.

"They weren't," Shirogane reassured him. "Very powerful, say our histories - but not gods." His eyes half-closed, as if he, too, were reaching along that sparkling trail of shadows. "Look back, Akira. Look far back, for eyes like no human's, or shin's, could ever be."

_Eyes_, Akira thought. _Eyes, in Kemet…._

A woman in gold and translucent linen, ornamented hand raised to unleash lightning on a hapless servant, eyes flashing white-gold.

"Goa'uld," Akira whispered, still tasting hints of desert dust. "They called themselves Goa'uld… that was _Egypt_."

"Thousands of years ago," Shirogane agreed. "And there, the gate was shut. How was it opened _here?_" The braid twitched as he shook his head. "Which is why I did not wish to do this alone. If you truly wanted to help."

Akira glanced up to that knowing smile, and rolled his eyes. "You knew I wouldn't say no."

"Well… I hoped, yes."

"Liar." But Akira said it fondly, unaccountably warmed. Shirogane had counted on him. It was nice to be needed. "How do you deal with it? With the memories?" He felt them like sparkling shards, sifting into the plain sands of human memory. It didn't hurt, but the world felt ever so slightly different.

_Could be my imagination. _

Then again, every other rei and shin he'd run into had been… well, benignly eccentric. At best. So maybe not.

"I've never not had them," Shirogane shrugged. And winked. "You're one of the most stubborn people I've ever met. They won't change you at all."

"Are you sure?" Akira said dubiously.

"Positive." Eyes bright with mischief, Shirogane leaned in, lips parted-

Akira squawked, ducked, and twisted aside. All too aware, even with the speed he'd mastered in shin form, that the direct king of the shadows _let_ him go.

"See?" Shirogane said impishly.

Breathing hard, Akira almost flipped him the finger. Hesitated. "Something is different."

Shirogane inclined his head. "You're one of my children now. It draws you to me."

_As if you weren't a bad enough flirt already._ Though it wasn't attraction. Just - Shirogane needed him, and the shadows needed him, and he belonged where he could help both. "It's not so bad," Akira admitted. "Just... strange."

"Belonging feels strange," Shirogane murmured. "I have to wonder about humans, these days."

Which tangled Akira up inside all over again. It wasn't exactly his friends' _fault_ they'd had to push him away when he had no power to defend himself. Or thought he didn't. _Gods, where's a kokuchi when you need one?_

Pressure, like a dark answer to a prayer.

"Downstairs," Shirogane nodded once, heading for the stairwell. "We'll have to come back to check the floors in between."

Racing beside him, Akira couldn't help but grin. This, he could handle.

"Glad you came?" Shirogane smiled, as they swept through the door like a gust of errant wind.

Like he'd ever admit that. "I think," Akira said, as they flitted down a flight at a time, "I _hate_ being ordinary."

A quick gleam of delighted blue. "So, after this is over…?"

"Yes," Akira said in a rush, before he could second-guess himself. "I'll help you. For as long as you need me."

"And if I'll always need you?"

Akira touched down on yet another landing, thrilling to the renewed reality of gravity defied. "Then I'll just have to come up with good excuses to be missing." He hesitated a moment, knowing how final this would be. "My king."

"My friend," Shirogane said firmly. "Always."

"Details later," Akira grinned. "Let's find a tear!"

------------

"They _lost_ a tourist?" Sam exclaimed in disbelief.

"Akira Nikaidou," Daniel read, looking at the picture NORAD had sent down from the visitor pass. Seventeen, brown hair - and startling gray eyes, for a name so determinedly Japanese. "Possible dual citizenship?"

"That's going to be messy when he hits eighteen," Jack said under his breath, drumming fingers on the conference room table. At Teal'c's raised brow, he elaborated, "Japan doesn't like having citizens who might have divided loyalties. Can't say I blame them. If I had an excuse, I'd kick the punk out, too."

Daniel sat up straight. "Punk?" Jack was usually a lot more sympathetic to kids than that. Even if seventeen was on the far edge of "kid".

"Dog collar and an earring?" Jack pointed out sourly. "He's looking for trouble."

"He has gray eyes in _Japan_, Jack. He doesn't have to go looking for trouble. It finds him." Daniel frowned, glancing over the picture again. Definitely not a real smile, now that he was really looking. The eyes were too wary. _Boy, do I ever know what that's like._

"Gray eyes are not favored in Japan?" Teal'c inquired.

"They're fine if you're a foreigner," Daniel shrugged, remembering a few late-night conversations he'd rather forget. "But the locals all have dark hair and eyes. Standing out, in that culture… it's not easy."

"Which is still no excuse for breaking the rules in a way that's likely to get you shot," Jack said bluntly.

_Aha_, Daniel realized. That would tend to make Jack cranky in pure self-defense, collar or no collar. Better a punk got shot than a kid.

Teal'c inclined his head. "It seems an unlikely identity for a Goa'uld to use to infiltrate the SGC."

_And thank goodness for Teal'c_, Daniel thought. That possibility hadn't even occurred to him.

"Hathor didn't seem all that likely, either," General Hammond observed. "Goa'uld or innocent bystander, the young man is _missing._ Which is not something that usually occurs when our friends upstairs are on watch. We have no reason to believe he's here…."

"But given nobody knows where he _is_, why not?" Jack said dryly. "Noted, sir. We'll keep an eye out."

The general nodded. "On the scientific front, Major - how is your work progressing?"

"Temporary setback, sir," Sam reported. "The Tok'ra device _seems_ to replicate Nirrti's results, but…."

"But?" Jack pounced.

"We can't seem to stabilize the effect," Sam frowned. "Not for more than a few seconds. And it takes a tremendous amount of power. More than whatever Nirrti was using, given she carried her device on her person."

"And you think you know why," Daniel said thoughtfully. That wasn't Sam's "don't have a solution yet" frown. That was a "just checked the calculations, and that's _not_ the result we were supposed to get" grimace.

And how much of that was scientific uncertainty, and how much personal, probably even Sam didn't know. In a way, Aldwin was the easier of the two Tok'ra to deal with. SG-1 didn't like him, he wasn't that fond of Tau'ri - they worked together because they each had their orders, and that was that.

Martouf, though… that was complicated. He and Lantash had loved Jolinar, and her former host. Feelings which seemed to have been transferred to Sam… sort of. Either that, or the Tok'ra definition of _love_ included a willingness to lie and deceive your significant other in ways that would make the most committed marriage break up. Add that to Sam's own conflicting feelings about Jolinar's possession-

_Rape_, Daniel thought; suddenly, coldly angry. _Call it what it was. Jolinar_ invaded _her._ Used _her. Terrified Cassie, almost got Sam killed… and she'll never,_ ever _be the same_.

If that wasn't rape, it was damn close.

_Jack's right. He is_ so _right. I don't like Martouf being here, either._

"I _think_," Sam said carefully, "that we can safely conclude that Nirrti's cloaking device works by shifting something out of phase; either the whole object, or a camouflaging layer around it, I'm not sure which. The Tok'ra device _isn't_ doing that."

"Invisible pennies," Jack pointed out.

"Oh, it does make small objects invisible, briefly," Sam agreed, "but if my readings and calculations are right, it's doing that by pushing the object _out_ of our dimensional space, into another subset of its strings' dimensions. And it takes so much power, because those dimensions are pushing _back_. Or our dimensional space is pulling it back like a rubber band, I can't tell…."

_Outside our dimensions. Matter appearing and disappearing…._ Struck by a sudden thought, Daniel dropped his pen. Stared. _No way._

"Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c looked mildly worried.

"Is it hot when it comes back?" Daniel said abruptly.

Sam blinked, shaking herself out of a haze of concentration. "Yes. Yes, it is. Daniel?"

"This is going to sound a little bizarre, but… we've got reports of phantoms, and cold spots - and we've got matter appearing out of thin air. Or _reappearing_, which still fits-" Daniel stopped, took a breath, and tried to put his thoughts in order. "Sam, have you ever heard of an apport?"

"No," she said honestly.

"Let me guess," Jack quipped. "Ghosts?"

"It's more associated with psychics and mediums, actually," Daniel admitted, feeling his face redden. "Producing objects that didn't seem to be there before. Sometimes they're real things - rocks, pennies, what have you - that were verifiably feet or even miles away. Sometimes, they literally don't seem to have _existed_ before the psychic pulled them out of the air. Or the poltergeist threw them at someone."

"Poltergeist, son?" Hammond said skeptically.

"I know what it sounds like." Daniel licked his lips, wishing he were anywhere else. "But that pushing and pulling Sam mentioned? It sounds like some of the descriptions I read, of people dealing with apports. Which _are_ associated with perfectly sane people seeing things, and unexplained temperature drops, and… well." _Great. Now I sound like I ought to be slammed back into the loony bin._

Which was almost enough to have kept him from mentioning it. Almost. But these were his friends. If there was any chance he was right… poltergeists were on record as being _dangerous_, sometimes.

"We have had alien entities pretending to be spirits in the past, sir," Sam pointed out.

_Angel, Sam._ Daniel hid a sigh of relief. _You're an angel._

"Noted," the general nodded. "If this does have similarities to an observed phenomenon, no matter how unusual… Dr. Jackson, can you sift out what may have some degree of scientific merit?"

"There's not much, but I have a few studies," Daniel nodded. "They're in my office. We could stop by there afterward. Or I could bring them down to the lab?"

"Your office is fine," Sam nodded. "I need some time to think, away from the circuitry." She turned back to the general. "I'll know more after I have a chance to review what Daniel found, but currently, I have two major concerns."

"Just two?" Jack muttered.

"Jack," Daniel murmured.

"Go on," Hammond nodded.

"First," Sam started, "if we're going to get this to work, I think it's going to take a lot of power. A jolt powerful enough to run the Stargate comes to mind."

"Yeowch." Jack winced. "Not the kind of juice we want to let the Tok'ra play with if they don't know what they're doing."

"Sir, I didn't say-"

Jack raised an eyebrow.

"Though that does lead to my second concern," Sam admitted, looking the general in the eye. "If we _do_ use enough power to overcome the dimensional resistance - I'm not sure we'll be able to get whatever we transfer _back_."

"Or in other words, don't ask for volunteers on this one, General," Jack said lightly.

"Indeed," Teal'c agreed. "It is not an invisibility device."

"But do the Tok'ra know that?" Daniel pointed out.

"They do, or they don't," Jack stated. "Either way? Not good."

"He's right, sir," Sam sighed. "_Invisible_ is here, but you can't see it. This - this is pushing things _somewhere else_. Somewhere we know nothing about. Which makes me a little uneasy about continuing the current series of tests."

_Ya think?_ was on the tip of Daniel's tongue. At least with the Stargate, they'd been able to send a MALP through first - and once they'd done that, they were pretty sure Abydos obeyed the same physical laws as the rest of the known universe. Somewhere that might _not_ - brr.

And yet, at the same time, the archaeologist felt a thrill he'd been missing for… a long time. Someplace else. Someplace _new_ - and yet old at the same time, if myths of the spirit world had any basis in reality. And why shouldn't they? Ra had been real; why not a world beyond human senses?

Then again, if it did… the denizens of the spirit world weren't always kind to stray mortals….

Recalling some of the darker stories, Daniel shivered.

"Honestly, sir, we should shut it all down now, go over all the calculations and data, and reexamine all of our theories," Sam stated. "Playing with dimensions we normally never interact with _might_ be perfectly safe. Or, it might set off a reaction that would leave the SGC a smoking hole in the ground. I _don't know_."

"Given how rarely you say that, Major, I agree." Hammond interlaced his fingers. "There's no reason such experimental research can't wait a day or two for more analysis."

"A day or two, sir?" Sam said, dismayed.

"Do you think you'll need more time to find a definite hazard, Major?"

"We've got to at least _look_ like we're playing nice," Jack smirked.

Daniel frowned. "General, Aldwin and Martouf have a pretty decent scientific background." _If they didn't, the Council wouldn't have sent them._ "They'll be able to judge the likelihood of any potential hazards Sam finds." _And if we really_ want _an alliance with the Tok'ra, what do you think they're going to do when they realize we're stonewalling them?_

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, Dr. Jackson."

_More like, burn it_, Daniel thought, spending a few extra seconds shuffling his notes together as the meeting broke up. Buying time to think. _What's_ wrong _with everyone?_

Not just the rest of SG-1, Daniel realized, feeling another irrational spike of anger as he and Sam reached his office. Sure, he hated what Jolinar had done, but feeling like he ought to hunt down and _strangle_ Martouf-

_Poltergeists feed off of negative emotions_.

Or were attracted by them; people in the field had wildly different opinions. But they did agree that a lot of poltergeist phenomena seemed calculated to unnerve people. Make them upset. Not thinking straight.

Given what the SGC had to deal with every day…. _Oh, this is not good._

"Not a lot." Sam frowned at the slim stack he handed her.

"Most evidence is anecdotal," Daniel admitted. "Which, as one researcher pointed out, doesn't keep people from studying the weather. But it does mean the reputable people in the field want very solid evidence. Like meteorites."

Sam eyed him, puzzled. "What do meteorites have to do with weather?"

And this from an astrophysicist? "Up until at least the eighteenth century, everything that fell out of the sky was weather," Daniel reminded her, frowning a little. He'd looked up the history - deep-space radar telemetry was the SGC's cover, after all, it'd be silly if he knew nothing about the subject. Sam should be able to remember this in her sleep. "There's an interesting account of solid, reliable people swearing they'd seen falling stars, and bringing in a lump of rock to prove it. Only to be branded liars by the scientific authority of their day, because everyone _knew_ it was impossible for rocks to fall from the sky."

"So people working on psychic phenomena think it's like meteors?" Sam looked at the papers again, with real interest. "Real, but we don't have the theoretical framework to explain it?"

"That's the idea. In fact-"

Someone knocked on the door. "Dr. Jackson?" The airman handed over an odd meter, and its manual. "You requested this."

"I did, yes." Daniel signed for it. "Thanks."

"_What_ are you doing with a _geomagnetometer?_" Interest had drained out of Sam's eyes, left them skeptical and angry.

"Looking for unexplained DC spikes?" Daniel gave her his most innocent smile. _Something's wrong. Way wrong._

"Do you even know how to use that?" Sam snatched the manual out of his hand, flipping through.

"Actually-" _Archaeology and geology go on a lot of the same trips_, he meant to say.

"Well, don't ask me if you get stuck. Get one of the rock people." She dropped the manual on his desk.

"I'll do that. Sam-" Daniel hesitated. "Are you feeling all right?"

"What kind of question is that?" Shaking her head, Sam stalked out the door.

"Really, really wrong," Daniel muttered under his breath. One minute she was there, thinking, if not clearly; the next, that weird anger had taken over completely. _Gods, how do I fix this?_

One step at a time. First, try to get _proof_. The SGC might not believe in ghosts, hauntings, or otherwise unexplained phenomena. But if he could document unexplained DC spikes - like, say, ones strong enough to be causing _hallucinations_ - then Sam would have a reason to shut down the testing.

And if they could manage that… well, maybe everyone would calm down enough to figure out what to do next.

Determined, he picked up the meter, and headed out.

------------

"Around here?"

Sergeant Siler nodded, hefting one of his heavier wrenches as he glanced around a mostly-empty corridor, one level above the labs. "Sure you don't want me to stick around? Something about the way this place feels lately…."

"I'll be fine," Daniel said firmly. Thought twice about it. "Though if you wouldn't mind asking Teal'c to head over this way in an hour or so?"

"Good level head, that man," Siler agreed. "Will do, Dr. Jackson."

"Thanks."

Alone with his thoughts and the low hum of the magnetometer, Daniel took measurements around the hall. A few airmen had reported this spot as unusually cold, it was near the labs, and Siler didn't like it. Sounded like a good place to start.

Nothing jumped out at him from the readings… but the meter's memory would store everything. Maybe a replay on more powerful computers might show something.

Though maybe they'd just show normal human magnetic readings, given an irritated lieutenant - Belson, by nametag - was stalking down the hall toward him with murder in his eyes. "This," Belson hissed, "this is all _your_ fault."

"That could cover a lot of ground," Daniel observed, trying to seem friendly. "Which _this_ did you have in mind? Urk!"

He dodged. And the lieutenant's fist crumbled a hole in the wall.

_Goa'uld?!?_

No glowing eyes. No reverberating voice. But what else could let a human being _do_ that? "Who are you?"

"Who am I?" the possessed lieutenant demanded, striking with another of those swift, bone-crushing punches. And another, and another. "Who do you think _you_ are, bringing aliens to Earth, making us _work_ with them - they're going to take over, and we're all going to die-!"

It felt like he'd been hit with a sledgehammer. Like _Teal'c_ with a sledgehammer. Which was insane.

Fingers. Gripping his neck. _Squeezing_.

Daniel fought back, clawing and twisting. Some of it he'd learned from Teal'c, and some from Jack - but the fingers still held, and vision was flashing red-black.

_Someday, Sam, I'm going to be glad you taught me this._

His thumb dug in, and gouged deep.

A pain-filled yell, and Belson flung him away. Daniel crashed into the wall, seeing stars, head reeling as he gasped for air. Glanced up, to see where the lieutenant had-

There was something _behind_ the bleeding man. Something huge, and shadowy, and vaguely reminiscent of a humanoid lizard. If lizards had blades for hands, and eyes that glowed red as any symbiote's.

Bladed arms lifted like a preying mantis', just before a strike.

"Look out!"

Daniel tackled Belson away from that swoop of blades, feeling a sudden breeze as one slashed open his shirt.

And then Belson's hands were wrapped around his throat. Again.

"You're one of them!" the lieutenant rasped, apparently blind to the monster stalking them both. "Kill you, before you kill us all!"

And then he blinked, and jerked, for all the world as if someone had kicked him in the head. _Hard_.

Screeching, the shadow-creature leaped-

And swerved in midair, as if dodging something Daniel couldn't see. Bladed arms swung and halted, swung again-

_Parrying?_ Daniel squirmed out of the lieutenant's loosened grip. Scrabbled to his feet. Time to call for backup. Even if he had to run across where the monster had appeared; it was just a floor, and the monster wasn't there _now_-

"No!" The voice was oddly faint, and vaguely familiar. "Not that way-!"

One more step, and he plunged into icy water.

_Not water._ Though what it _was_, Daniel couldn't have said. Everything was shadowed; upside-down, and dark as if it'd never been touched by so much as a candle flame. Yet he could see every detail of the corridor as he floated in midair… that _wasn't_ air. Air you could breathe, and he _couldn't_, even as something alien and unknowable dragged him down, crushing him like the depths of the sea.

_Like drowning… it's this place, it's_ not _the SGC… Sam's alternate dimensions? I shouldn't be here…._

A hand grabbed his, warm against the darkness. _Yanked_.

Coughing and sputtering, Daniel tried to climb out of the well of _other_. Felt his hands slip through the… floor?

_The floor's fluid. Like water._ The archaeologist's eyes bugged as he tried to fight free. _Gods, the world's insane._

"Stop thrashing, damn it!" A young man's voice, worried and angry. "You _won't_ get out on your own. And you're not exactly light!"

…_I've been saved by a vampire._

Not exactly rational, much less scientific. Not to mention that the hand gripping his was _warm_, without any pallor of the grave. And yet, the young man holding him had hair black enough to make Night envious, eyes a deep, inhuman ruby, a poet's white shirt with an odd red cross on one lapel, under a sleeveless dark coat that belonged to another century, and _no shadow…._

Though the romantic vampire look was sort of jarred by the black, silver-buckled dog collar around his throat, the lone silver earring in his left ear, and the multiply-buckled black boots. Boots with a heavy, distinctly modern tread, that was a suspiciously good match to the red mark blooming on Belson's jaw.

"Heavy only makes a difference if you let it." A light, laughing voice - yet serious all the same, as a tall man in a long dark coat fended off the shadow-creature with slashing blows of his cane, inhumanly long silver braid floating in the wind of his strikes.

"_Thrashing_ doesn't," the young vampire griped, for all the worlds sounding like a cranky teenager.

Teenager. Collar. _Earring_. Daniel blinked, realizing just where he'd seen that face before. "Akira? Akira Nikaidou?"

"Damn," the teenager breathed. Red eyes widened. "Duck!"

Daniel sloshed sideways, as Akira's free hand lashed out, catching Belson's fist before it could strike… and before the lieutenant could plunge into the same dark well. "Shirogane!" Akira yelled.

"Busy!" floated back, as the silver-haired man plunged his blue-glowing cane through a shadow's heart, shattering it in red sparks. He ducked, and twirled, dodging three more of the creatures.

"Multiplying. Great," Akira snarled, flinging the lieutenant back with an effortless ease Teal'c might have envied.

"Let go, and you can-" Daniel started.

"If I let go, you'll fall. If you fall back into the shadows, you'll _die_." Akira's eyes narrowed, thinking fast. "He hates you? Play dead."

_And how much good is that going to do when he can_ hear _you?_ But Daniel let himself go limp, barely peeking out of shut eyes. For some odd reason, Belson still wasn't focused on the kid who'd hit him….

And the lieutenant actually relaxed, laughing with a manic edge as he stalked toward them. "Over. It's all over, you'll never help them again…."

Akira lunged. Fingers sinking into Belson's chest, as if flesh were rippling water.

Yanked back, dragging something shadowy, with a centipede's wealth of legs, writhing and shrieking out of him. Belson collapsed.

One hand full of archaeologist, the other of shrieking monster, Akira grimaced. And tossed the monster up.

"Oh, no-" Daniel started to protest.

Akira's left hand _shifted_ - and a hunting knife shimmered into existence, slicing through shadow. The creature squealed, and disintegrated.

"Neatly done." Not a hair out of place, Shirogane strolled over to them. "My, this _is_ unfortunate."

"He needs help," Akira said, low and urgent.

Shirogane dropped fluidly into a crouch beside them, regarding the archaeologist through antique dark lenses that didn't hide a wry sympathy. "You saw his shadow shatter. You can keep him alive a little longer, but there's only one thing that will help him now."

Akira gave him a shaky sigh. "Can you do it?"

"Hmm. What is your name?" Shirogane raised oddly dark brows.

_He has sapphire stud earrings_, Daniel saw. Which only made him seem more odd. "Daniel. Dr. Daniel Jackson-"

"Oh dear." Shirogane shook his head, and glanced at Akira, bright blue eyes amused. "You saved him. He's your responsibility."

"But, I can't-!"

"Yes," Shirogane nodded, utterly serious. "You can."

"He can _what?_" Daniel burst out. "My _shadow_ shattered? That's crazy! Shadows don't - they can't…." Words died in his throat, as he took in the utter impossibility before him. Not his imagination. _Not_ a trick of the light.

"…You don't have shadows…."

"We are shadows." Shirogane's pale pink lips bent in a slight, knowing smile. "We are shin. As you must be, if you're to survive."

_"What?" _

"There's no time!" Akira pulled him a little farther out of the floor. "I'll explain later, I promise - but a shin can survive without a shadow. A human _can't_." He shook his head. "Daniel, will you trust me?"

"Trust you?" Daniel shot back. "You _broke into_ the SGC-"

"To stop the kokuchi. To keep people from getting hurt. Like he did." Akira jerked his head toward Belson. "Like _you_ did."

"Just tell me what's going on!" Daniel bit out.

"The wall between the worlds has been torn, Dr. Jackson," Shirogane said bluntly. "And we must mend it, before everyone in this mountain dies."

_Other dimensions._ Forcing _things out of our world._ "I'm in," Daniel sighed.

Akira smiled warily at him, and drove one of his knives into the floor.

And the world was light.

_"Listen! Seed that is sleeping within your heart…." _

The words weren't English or Japanese. They were something else. Something older.

_"I am a shadow of everything created. I am one who tunes Heaven and Earth." _

Light blazed in spirals around the trapped archaeologist, lifting him into the air. _Oh, this was a_ bad _idea…._

_"Black flame blowing forth from the other world…."_ Something glowed in Akira's hands, glowed _through_ them, red and alien as the monsters' eyes. _"The seal of true darkness…." _Akira stepped into the column of light. _"Engrave thyself, here!" _

It was oddly like a kiss of peace, Daniel felt, as Akira's lips touched his forehead. Formal, ritualistic-

And… why was he vibrating inside? As if every cell were being shaken, altered, into something cool and alien….

_Vibrating… other dimensions… didn't Sam say what we think are particles, might be just vibrations of the superstrings-_

Everything blazed.

------------

_Tuning_, Akira thought, dazed by the power flooding through him. _Good word for it._

It was like reaching out and molding static with his bare hands. Gathering up a scatter of frequencies like matchsticks, and aligning the random array into a crystalline strength that could hold a mountain. The amorphous energies of a dying, dark inshi were there, and if he just _reached_-

And folded-

And _forged_-

_There._

A shin's pure shadow glowed in his mind; narrow-focused as a laser, and far more deadly.

_Mine! My child, my… what am I thinking?_

Shaking his head, Akira reeled. Shirogane's hand gripped his shoulder, kept him from falling. "Well done," his friend murmured.

"You made it look easy," Akira muttered back.

"Did I?" Shirogane smiled. "Well met, Dr. Jackson."

"This," the man said shakily, "had better be one _hell_ of an explanation."

Curious, Akira glanced his way. And stifled a snicker. Near-white blond hair, red-orange eyes - not too outlandish, as shin went. But the clothes, complete with whip, pistol, and fedora….

"I'm an archaeologist," Daniel said dryly. "Not Indiana Jones!"

Shirogane didn't quite chuckle, but blue eyes were devilishly bright. "Don't blame Akira for the outfit. The change can only work with what's already there."

"Likely story- Whoa!" Daniel jumped back from the dark tear. "Where did _that_ come from?"

"Why, that's what you fell into," Shirogane said innocently. "Despite Akira's best efforts to prevent you."

_Ah, the Aura of Blame_, Akira reflected with a tired smile. _He's so good at that._ "It's a tear in the boundary. Between the world of light - the world you know - and the world of shadow. If we don't mend it… it'll be bad."

"Bad. As in, giant blade-handed lizards?" Daniel said pointedly. "Or whatever you dragged out of Lieutenant Belson?"

"Believe me, the kokuchi are the _least_ of what could happen," Shirogane said frankly. "They can be fought. And destroyed. Other effects… are more difficult to undo. And more deadly."

"Kokuchi?" Daniel frowned. "You used that word before… which of them was it?"

"They both were," Akira shrugged. "Shirogane was dealing with combat-type kokuchi. The one in… Belson? That was a parasite kokuchi. Try not to blame him too much. They get inside a human, and make them go after… destructive things. He might not even remember any of this tomorrow." Belatedly, Akira eyed the blood. "Though he's going to notice that."

"Possibly not." Shirogane bent over the fallen man a moment; stood up, darkness dissipating from his hand as the man's bloody flesh smoothed into a simple bruise. "There. That should handle most of the questions. Dr. Jackson, please step away from the boundary… Akira? I could seal this alone, but it would be easier with two."

Akira nodded, kneeling at the near side of the tear as Shirogane skirted the darkness to its far edge. One hand on the floor, _feeling_ how light and dark were torn here, how they _should_ be….

_"Our hands are the healers of zero; the mirror which divides heaven and earth." _

Another flood of power, and… he was tired this time.

Braid trailing on the floor, Shirogane smiled encouragement at him.

_I can do this_, Akira told himself. _I_ will _do this._

_"Light must stay in light, and dark in dark."_

Molding static all over again; only this was a more gentle sifting, parting the cacophony into a pair of intertwined melodies.

_Hold on. Just a little longer. It's closing…._

_"Return to your own master. Seal!"_

Oh. Solid floor. Nice.

"Akira-kun!"

"Is he okay?" Daniel's footsteps, nearing quickly.

_Loud_ footsteps. Akira winced, as they rung in his skull like gongs. _You're shin. Gravity. Doesn't hold. Figure it out._

Silent as shadow, Shirogane still got there first. Akira wasn't surprised. "I think he overdid it a little." The shadow king picked him up, easily as a bouquet of flowers. "Forgive me. That was a bit much, all at once."

"Mmph." Akira let his head roll into Shirogane's shoulder. The silver-haired shin always smelled nice; like evening rain and moonlight and the shade of trees. "I'm okay." And… this was altogether too embarrassing a position, if Shirogane decided to turn playful flirt. Again.

But his friend's hold didn't even stray toward a caress, as Shirogane kept a watchful eye on Daniel. "He will be fine. Soon. Now, I believe you were owed an explanation-"

"You could start with why you don't want anyone to know you're here," Daniel said levelly. "From what I've seen, you don't even want people to know this happened."

"Put me down," Akira said in an undertone. Eyed Daniel as he stood - and if Shirogane was still propping him up, well, he could live with that. "Most people will never know anything happened. They don't _want_ to. Trust me."

Red-orange was stubborn. "That's _not_ how we do things here."

Fine. Good glare. It still wasn't half as bad as Aya's in a bad mood. Much less Homurabi's. "In case you hadn't noticed," Akira said, feeling his temper start to fray at the edges, "we aren't, exactly, _here!_"

"We're still in the SGC-" Daniel stopped, and looked around. "Aren't we?"

"Not what I meant," Akira groaned. "Look… can we find someplace to talk? I get annoyed when people look through me."

"Look- We're _invisible?_"

"Obscure," Shirogane said cheerfully. "There's a difference." He tipped his hat. "Perhaps we might talk over lunch? It's been a _very_ long morning."


	2. Chapter 2

"Sometimes I forget how much teenagers can eat," Daniel muttered under his breath.

_Well, I'm sure he_ thought _it was under his breath_, Shirogane thought ruefully, as Akira looked up long enough to glare. "We have somewhat better hearing than you may be used to, Dr. Jackson," Shirogane said politely. "Listen."

"Listen? I don't hear anything-" The archaeologist started, and looked about the cafeteria with wide eyes.

_Distracted. Good._ Shirogane nibbled the rest of his own snack, as Akira stiffened his shoulders and went back to devouring his meal. If he'd needed any more proof that Akira was taking the situation seriously, that speed would have been enough. Usually, the teenager dawdled over his meals; drawing them out, as much as possible, to stave off the crippling boredom he faced every day. It must be a bit embarrassing, breaking that habit in front of a stranger.

_Not that you've anything to be embarrassed about_, Shirogane knew, eyeing the remains of his own thick sandwich. _That_ was _a bit much to ask of a young shin. Even a young king._

For a moment, Shirogane's smile turned wicked. _Not that you know that's what you are. Yet._

For good reason. Akira hadn't _wanted_ to be Ryuko. And given these past months watching him deal with life as a human, Shirogane could finally understand why.

_He's so alone. _

Father dead, and barely spoken of; mother only dropping in once or twice a month, between high-powered deals as some sort of international company lawyer. Most of her visits consisted of: Check the fridge. (Akira kept it well stocked, with acceptable, nutritious, and never extravagant food.) Check Akira's grades. (One of the top five in the school, despite Akira's loathing of and general skipping of classes at every opportunity, which drove Aya absolutely up the wall.) Check the boy was actually wearing clothes. (Akira not only did his own wash, he ironed his uniform.)

And then she'd be off again, satisfied Akira would be a very skilled and highly-paid lawyer one day.

It was enough to drive a shin to kidnapping. If he hadn't known Akira's pride by then - if he hadn't _known_ his friend would never forgive him - well, one day, Mrs. Nikaidou would have simply come home to an empty house.

_"Isn't it all right for the two of us to live together from now on?" _

He'd offered that, the very first dawn. And oh, how he sometimes wished Akira had said yes. But he hadn't. He wouldn't.

_He's been taking care of himself so long, he doesn't know how to take care of other people. Or let them care for him._

But Akira was learning. Slowly. And in twenty years, or thirty, when Ryuko's next incarnation appeared… well, they'd need another king of shadows to keep the worlds balanced.

_In twenty years, I think he'll be a very good king. _

Not that Shirogane had any intent of even whispering that to Akira. Not yet. The young man had only just admitted to himself that he _wanted_ to be shin. Anything more could wait.

_After all, I want to keep him off guard long enough to introduce me to his aunt. Any woman who could make Akira_ want _to study to perfect his English, just to speak to her and read her letters, must be formidable indeed._

Not actually an aunt, more a third cousin of some degree - but the fact that she was all the other family Akira seemed to have had driven home how _alone_ his young shin was. He'd actually spoken to her on the phone, once, in the midst of the mess with Homurabi. For a rare few minutes, Akira had been _his_ shadow, so Shirogane could assure her he was just a sick friend taking shelter with her young relation.

_I wonder; Akira did say she lived in the States…._

"How do you _listen_ to all that?" The cafeteria wasn't even a quarter full, and they were at the quietest table in the far corner, but Dr. Jackson still looked as if he'd been blasted by a rock concert.

"You grow accustomed to it," Shirogane smiled. Created shin did, at least. Those that survived.

_If Daniel can't handle it… I won't put that burden on Akira. He'd do it, I know he would - but he's still young. He shouldn't have to kill a man he saved. Not yet. _

Hopefully, not ever. Jackson wasn't a rare name, but combined with the resemblance to a face seen decades ago, and the inshi Akira didn't yet realize he had _recognized_ as he shaped it-

_One of our missing kin, reclaimed. Good. _

Though he didn't know _this_ Jackson. Not yet. Which was why he wasn't about to walk Akira through recalling the means to grant other shin their communal memory. Just as he hadn't linked Akira to it until the young man was _certain_ what he wanted to be.

_Too heavy, that weight, for an innocent soul to bear. And far too dangerous, for the rest of us, if he's not innocent at all. Homurabi was proof of that._

"So… what is going on, exactly?" Daniel asked warily.

"There are two worlds." Akira stole a napkin from the table holder, folded it in half, dripped a few drops of soda on it, and opened it again. "Think of this half as the world of light, and the other as shadow." He pointed to a droplet. "This is a human. Or a house, or a tree, or anything you know." Moved his finger to the drop's counter-image. "This is what you call a shadow. Your doppleganger. It _has_ to exist in the shadow world, for you to exist in the light. It… supports you, kind of. It's half of what you are." Fingers closed in a frustrated fist. "I don't know how to explain…."

"It can wait," Daniel said thoughtfully. "So mine - shattered?"

"When you fell into the shadow world through the tear," Shirogane nodded. "You and your doppleganger can't share the same space at the same time. It disintegrated - and without a shadow, you would have perished soon after."

"But shin _are_ shadows?" Daniel frowned. "So how can you exist in this world? The world of light."

"It's not always easy," Shirogane admitted. "We need a certain amount of dark energy to sustain ourselves. Most of which we can gather from the environment; tiny holes open and close in the boundary all the time. And we have… less direct counterparts than a human does." But for now, the less said about the rei, the better. "In short, we are more focussed than a human's natural energies, which allows us to exist in either realm. Though to interact normally with humans does require certain extra measures."

"I noticed," Daniel muttered, shaking his head at the oblivious military personnel all around them. "They really don't see us?"

"Really," Akira nodded, finishing off a stray brownie crumb. "Though, as many people as are in this mountain, there's probably somebody sensitive enough to at least see kokuchi. They _might_ be able to see us. If the darkness is really bad."

"Usually, people think shin and kokuchi are spirits, or phantoms," Shirogane informed Daniel. "Which is just as well, when tears in the boundary are small, and the kokuchi are only briefly visible as they mend them. But if a tear becomes large enough for a kokuchi to emerge fully into this world… they aren't intrinsically evil. They have no real will of their own. But this world appears to be one massive hole to them. They'll attack humans viciously, and indiscriminately."

Almost true. They went after hidden rei and shin in particular. Possibly a response to knowing that here was someone who should help, and was not. Who knew?

"Ghosts," Daniel said under his breath. "Oh, Jack is going to _love_ this." He shook his head. "So… why are the tears so bad here?"

"I've no idea," Shirogane said innocently. "Normally, the boundary thins when Earth's magnetic field fluxes. Between ten at night, and before dawn, are usually the worst times. For a rip to be so large, and a kokuchi invading in daylight - that normally can't happen. Unless…."

"Unless?" Daniel asked warily.

Akira gulped the last of his soda, and gave Daniel a considering look. "Unless something from one world is pushing into the other."

Daniel's brows shot up. "And you think I'd know something about that?"

"You had a magnetometer." Akira glanced at Shirogane. "I looked them up when we were checking ghost spots for tears. But it was faster just to feel them."

"So you did know there were magnetic disturbances." Shirogane nodded once. "Then perhaps you also know how the gate of the stars has been opened, when it was sealed for all time in Kemet, millennia ago?"

Daniel _stared_ at him.

"You are not of the Goa'uld; we'd have seen that in your shadow," Shirogane said bluntly. "Do you not know what danger you have invited?"

"Planet-conquering aliens who want our bodies," Daniel quipped. "But by the time we found that out, it was too late. They _know_ we're here. Shut the Stargate, and we lose the only chance we've got for an early warning."

Shirogane frowned. "But the gate has been shut before-"

"When Ra's ships would have needed centuries to get here," the archaeologist cut across his words. "It wasn't worth it. Then. But they've gotten faster. Now, they can get here inside a month."

"So even aliens have mad scientist breakthroughs," Akira said numbly. "Oh, wonderful."

_Inside a month._ Shirogane swallowed dryly. "I think I need to sit down."

Akira glanced his way, worried. "You are sitting down."

"Oh. That's good…."

"Shirogane." Akira moved behind him, rested hands on his shoulders. "We'll think of something. We always do."

_Thank the true gods for you, Akira. I need your faith._ "It took countless lives to drive them from Earth the first time," Shirogane stated, staring into awful memory. "Of humans, and of shin; the Goa'uld did not know what we were, what we could do, and still they managed to slay so many of us…."

"You have records?" Daniel blurted out. "Of the rebellion? All we know is what we found on Abydos, and-" He stopped himself. "Okay. Long story short. Archaeologists found the Stargate on the Giza Plateau in 1928-"

"Where it had been _sealed for all time_," Shirogane said tartly.

"Yes, but nobody could _read_ that on the coverstone," Daniel said practically. "Well, until I came along. You can read hieroglyphs?"

"We can," Shirogane nodded. Akira might have to search for those memories the first time, but he could do it. "It's one of many things we've kept alive."

"Wow, I'd love to hire you… anyway. Seventy-five years later, I was offered a translating job here. I really, really needed the job… so we figured out how to open the 'Gate. To Abydos." Daniel eyed them. "You know that name."

"I do," Shirogane admitted. _I was there once. A long time ago._ "One of Ra's many worlds. Source of a mineral he could not find here. We never knew what happened to those trapped on the other side of the gate. We could only save ourselves, and our world. It… isn't pleasant history."

"It wouldn't be," Daniel said sympathetically. "Well. We got there, ran into Ra, started an uprising, blew him to pieces."

"And the _other_ Goa'uld?" Akira asked wryly.

"Ah. Yeah. That, we didn't know about. The Abydonians hadn't mentioned other gods, and the story they hid - well, they had to write it fast, and some of the words were a little ambiguous…."

"Oh no," Akira groaned.

"Um. Oops?" Daniel gave them a wry, tired smile. "We've been fighting the Goa'uld since we ran into Apophis. Killed some of them. And we've found allies, as well. Including the Tok'ra."

"Those against Ra?" Shirogane frowned. "Who?"

"Well… they're Egeria's offspring. And they only take willing hosts." Daniel's voice dropped. "Most of the time."

"Egeria's children are your allies?" Shirogane said skeptically. "Why not Macha? Or Yu? Or Ba'al? Any of the gods would have brought Ra down, if only they'd dared. What makes her different?"

"Egeria was a System Lord?" Daniel looked caught between curiosity and exasperated anger. "Funny, how they neglected to mention that." He shook his head. "Anyway, two of them are guests on the base right now. So, if you could maybe not do anything drastic?"

"We'll avoid them," Shirogane allowed. "For now. But I would be lying if I said I approved of their presence. We _died_ to force their kind from our world." _And shin do not die easily._ "That any of them have returned is… extremely unpleasant."

"And speaking of not liking things…." Daniel licked his lips, nervous. "Do these tears _do_ things to people? Everybody seems to be upset, and there's no good reason for it. Even I wanted to - to hurt someone, a while ago. And I just don't do that."

Shirogane traded a speaking glance with Akira. "It is bad, then."

"Dark energy does that to regular people," Akira told Daniel. "Some people can stand more than others. People get angry. Tired. Upset. And that draws the parasite kokuchi."

"Oh. Great," Daniel said faintly. "So we could end up possessed?"

"Kokuchi are creatures of shadow, just as we are," Shirogane stated. "To us, they're quite solid. They can't invade us - and since we feed on dark energy, it doesn't upset us to draw them in the first place."

Daniel perked up at that. Started to speak, and hesitated. "I'd really, really like to ask you questions about the rebellion. For oh, at least a week. I don't suppose you'd consider sticking around for a while, after we fix this?"

"I will consider it," Shirogane said cautiously. _We'd have to in any case. Daniel can't go untaught._ But speaking of the Goa'uld when two of their number were here… that wasn't worth the risk.

"Then I guess I've just got one more question." Daniel nodded toward Akira. "He looked normal on the tour. Can we do that?"

Akira groaned softly. "Gods, not in here…."

"No; we certainly don't want to appear in full view of armed strangers," Shirogane chuckled. "There is a way. We'll tell you about it as we search. Yes?"

"All right." Daniel stood. "Search where?"

------------

"This is where you last saw Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked, eyeing the unconscious lieutenant on the floor with a suspicious frown.

"This is the gadget he was using," Sergeant Siler said grimly, picking an odd meter off the floor. "_Knew_ I shouldn't have left him."

"You had your duties," Teal'c acknowledged. And he was certain it was duty that had called the man away. So far, he had not seen any of the recent instances of irrational irritation in Sergeant Siler. Unlike many other of his fellow warriors. "And Daniel Jackson is not defenseless."

As one, their gazes went back to the bruised man on the floor.

Frowning, Teal'c checked for signs of serious injury, then prodded the man in a less than pleasant location. Belson twitched, but did not wake. "I will take him to Janet Fraiser."

"And this?" Siler held up the device.

"I believe I will bring it to Major Carter." Teal'c met Siler's worried look. "I do not think Daniel Jackson would have been so careless as to abandon it."

"Me, neither," Siler admitted. "What are you looking for now?"

"There was a struggle here." Tread marks on the floor, and powdered concrete from the wall. "With something of greater than human strength."

"Aww, no… what the hell is _that?_"

Teal'c regarded the gash in the floor. "It appears to have been cut."

"That's _concrete!_"

"Indeed."

"Great. Just great." Siler frowned, one hand dipping to his tools for comfort.

"What is it you perceive?" Teal'c inquired. The man had not become one of the SGC's most gifted mechanics by being unobservant.

"It's just kind of odd," Siler admitted. "When I came up here with Dr. Jackson… it didn't feel safe. No good reason for it; just one of those things, you know?"

"I do," Teal'c acknowledged. He had avoided ambush on several occasions by regarding what O'Neill might refer to as "bad feelings".

"And now it just feels like the rest of the base." Siler narrowed his eyes at Lieutenant Belson. "Just hope the doc can get some answers out of him."

"We will find answers," Teal'c stated, picking up the man bodily. "One way, or another."

------------

"That," Daniel said, eyeing the odd black stuffed toy in his hands as they walked down yet another corridor, "is one of the most-" _ridiculous_ "-um, unusual things I've seen on this base."

"Go ahead and say it," Akira sighed. "It's ridiculous." Another sigh. "But it works." He eyed Shirogane. "Do I want to know why you're carrying more of them?"

"Just in case?" Shirogane said innocently.

"And… you step on it?" Daniel went on, not sure he'd heard that part right.

"Yes. Though that's best left for a place you'll be alone," Shirogane nodded. "Humans tend not to take kindly to people appearing out of thin air."

_No kidding._ "And some people can see you anyway," Daniel said thoughtfully. "You're a secretive people, and this is a military base. Why risk coming down here?"

"Because people would have died if we hadn't!" Akira said hotly. Red eyes glanced away, troubled. "They still might."

"And because it is what we do," Shirogane said levelly. "Shin exist, in large part, to maintain the balance between light and shadow. It is our duty. Just as you consider it yours to face the Goa'uld."

Daniel frowned at Akira. "Aren't you a little young to be fighting?"

"This isn't fighting." The teen's smile had a grim edge. "This is _combat_. Heads up!"

_A seventeen-year-old shouldn't_ be _in combat_, was what Daniel wanted to say. Before Akira _moved_.

Jaw dropped, the archaeologist could only watch, stunned. _That - gravity - no way!_

He felt like looking for the wires. Or traces of blue-screen. Akira moved like a swordsman, like a dancer; like gravity had suddenly become only a suggestion, not the law. Translucent hunting knives slashed out, up, across; blocked a dark stab, or deflected it, and sliced home to the core.

Watching the teen bounce off the ceiling, Daniel decided, was not helping his nerves at _all_.

Shirogane was easier to look at. The same grace, the same flowing motion as he stabbed through kokuchi after kokuchi… but at least he stayed on the floor. Mostly.

"You can jump in anytime!" Akira called back to him.

"But-" He'd never seriously handled a whip in his life, and there was no way he wanted to use a pistol where there were innocent bystanders scattered around - bystanders Shirogane and Akira were _blithely ignoring_-

"Your weapon is an extension of yourself." Shirogane dealt an open-handed blow that left a shadow-creature shattering into fragments. "Don't _think_. Just strike!"

Something about that tone of voice…. Daniel stared at vibrant, wicked blue, just in time to see the slightest smile bend pink lips.

And Shirogane danced aside, letting his next opponent fly past.

_Oh, hell! _

The whip lashed out, and the razor beak snapped at him, and Daniel was suddenly very, _very_ busy.

"Aim for the core!" Akira called out.

_Core. Center of mass?_ And how he was supposed to do that with a whip, he'd like to know-

But his hands seemed to get it, if his brain was clueless. The whip lashed out again, and Daniel's enemy blazed into red sparks.

Akira landed by him, just for one brief instant. "One down." A quick grin. "Lots to go!"

…_Oh, terrific. _

------------

Any day Teal'c showed up in Sam's lab with a gadget, Jack decided, was not going to be a good day.

"Daniel Jackson is missing," the Jaffa said gravely.

Yep. Definitely not a good day.

"Daniel's missing?" Sam blurted out, abandoning her fruitless argument with Aldwin over the merits of a day off to pound on calculations with a bigger data-hammer. Martouf, sane guy that he was, had given up half an hour ago, and was currently going through Tau'ri printouts with a pencil and a thoughtful look. "How?"

"It is possible these readings may inform us," Teal'c stated, handing over the thingamabob. "Its placement suggests it was left deliberately." He turned to Jack. "I have requested that security footage of the area be sent to your office."

Martouf glanced up at that. "You believe he is not voluntarily missing."

"Danny doesn't go _voluntarily_ missing," Jack said darkly. Not in his right mind, at least.

"There were signs of a struggle," Teal'c reported. "Lieutenant Belson was injured. Janet Fraiser will inform us when he regains consciousness."

Aldwin flinched. "You have intruders in the SGC?"

Yep. The man did not handle up close and personal threats well. "Kind of a once a week thing," Jack said dryly.

"Do we know anything else?" Sam asked, worried.

"Not yet," Teal'c allowed.

"So, let's see what's on camera." Jack headed out the door. "_Not_ you guys," he added pointedly, when Martouf stood to follow. "If we've got an alert, we've got itchy trigger fingers, and a lot of people haven't forgotten Netu yet."

Out in the corridor with Teal'c, safely away from the physics equations, Jack eyed the Jaffa. "So what don't we want them to know?"

"Janet Fraiser has scanned Lieutenant Belson. He has no symbiote."

Good news. And not. "Whoa, whoa - you were worried he had a snake because?"

"Evidence in the corridor indicates he attacked Daniel Jackson." Teal'c regarded Jack soberly. "There is a hole in the wall, from a human fist. And concrete dust on Lieutenant Belson's hand. Yet he has no broken bones. He has, indeed, few injuries - and none that would explain why he is not conscious."

Not good. "Janet's got security on the guy?"

"Indeed." Teal'c frowned. "There was also a cut in the floor. I was unable to locate any weapon that could do such damage in the lieutenant's possession."

"So Belson had help, and that help took Danny." Oh yeah. _Lousy_ day.

"It is possible," Teal'c agreed.

Right. Check the tape. See what they could find out.

Only when they got to his office, there were two tapes. And a very nervous airman. "Um… NORAD sent this down, sir," he reported. "With the note."

_Okay, wise guys_, read the yellow sticky-note on the outer case. _This? Is_ your _problem._

"Our missing tourist," Jack concluded, reading the more formal label attached. "Which should we see first?"

"It would be unlikely that the two events are unrelated," Teal'c declared.

"What I thought." Scowling, Jack played NORAD's footage.

There was the punk again, caught at the tail of the tour group as it paused in one of the last rooms. The guide droned on, the room lights went down for a slideshow-

And the teenager's form _wavered_, collapsing into a darker shadow. And gone.

"I think we found our intruder." _I knew that kid was bad news._

"It appears likely," Teal'c agreed.

"Get that to the general, and Security," Jack said grimly. "So, Danny, what were you up to?"

The first few minutes of the hallway view were unremarkable, if you didn't count Danny waving around his gadget with the kind of confidence Jack usually associated with a certain blonde astrophysicist. And then Belson walked into the picture.

The angle wasn't the best; they were looking at things right on the edge of the camera's coverage. But it didn't take a great view to see dust fly as Belson's punch powdered part of the wall. And then things got _nasty_.

Jack's fist clenched as Daniel managed to get free. Good, moving - what the _hell?_

Stop. Rewind. Replay.

"Something else is present," Teal'c concluded, watching slashed cloth flutter. "Yet the camera could not record it."

"Something Danny thought was worse than Belson," Jack said, eyes narrowed as the lieutenant tried to strangle his archaeologist. Danny broke free again, good; ran for backup, also good-

And fell into the floor.

Jack blinked.

Danny surfaced, gasping like a drowning man, in an abrupt way that implied someone had _yanked_ him up. Only there was nothing _there_.

Except _nothing_ couldn't have stopped Belson cold, then tossed him like a rag doll.

"The entity is assisting Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c inquired.

"Maybe." Jack frowned as Belson collapsed, and Daniel gesticulated, still half in the floor. "He's talking to _somebody_."

"Two individuals," Teal'c judged. "One holds him. The other is nearby."

"And Danny's in we-come-in-peace mode," Jack agreed. "Damn it, Danny, you're supposed to have guns behind you when you do that-"

The image blinked to static.

Jack rapped on the monitor, growled when it didn't clear. "Oh, fun."

"It seems an unlikely time to destroy the camera," Teal'c frowned.

"Unless they don't care if we know they're here, but there's something they really didn't want us to see," Jack said tartly. "Danny, if you just walked off to make nice with invisible bad guys, you and me are going to have a _talk_."

The phone rang. "O'Neill," he answered.

"Colonel?" Sam's voice was troubled. "Part of the magnetometer's memory was blanked. Like it got hit with an EMP."

"Just like the camera," Jack stated. "Anything on what's left?"

"Mostly just human electromagnetic readings," Sam replied. "Though there are some anomalies…."

"As in?" Jack asked.

"Well, as in… something, or several things, flying through the air. Sir."

Jack traded a glance with Teal'c. "Any timestamp on those readings? There's some security footage you ought to match up with it."

"I'll ask them to send it down," Sam said grimly.

Jack hung up, and drummed his fingers on the desk. "Now we just have to tell the general Danny got kidnapped by an invisible NORAD tourist."

"We do not know Akira Nikaidou was present," Teal'c pointed out.

"No. We don't." Jack's eyes narrowed. "But Research is going to check out whoever this kid's supposed to be. Right now, he's our best lead."

------------

"So… do you do this a lot?" Daniel asked, as the two shin leaned against a wall by the barracks after sealing yet another small tear. "Save the world, kill monsters… Shanghai innocent bystanders?"

Shirogane arched a genteel brow. "Oh? Do you consider yourself innocent?"

But it was Akira's wry, half-hidden smile that caught Daniel's eye. "You do, don't you?" the archaeologist said, surprised. "Is that how you got mixed up in this? By accident?"

"Kind of," Akira said after a moment. "Shirogane tried to warn me. I was too freaked out by the kokuchi to listen. And by the light-show." He favored the older shin with a dubious look. "Did it ever occur to you that _don't go outside the barrier, the kokuchi will eat you_, was going to make any sane person run from the insane maniac?"

"Well… no?"

_See what I have to deal with?_ Akira's eye-roll stated.

Daniel stifled a snicker. Really, once you got past their odd appearances, they were remarkably human. A lot more comfortable to deal with than the Tok'ra, at least. "So Shirogane had to make you a shin."

Akira nodded reluctantly. "Most people don't have the inshi - the energies you need. If they fall into the shadows, it kills them. Unless you can pull them out pretty fast."

Daniel frowned. "But you said it was my doppleganger shattering…."

"You had a dark inshi. It made your doppleganger more solid than most," Shirogane stated. "So it shattered when you fell. For those without an inshi, their doppleganger scatters instead. Like light on water. The energies aren't coherent enough to fracture. Which is safer, in a way."

Made sense. Kind of. Though Daniel had a feeling there was a _lot_ they weren't telling him.

"This is like trying to cover all of Tokyo in one night!" Akira exclaimed, frustrated. "And we can't jump the rooftops."

"We could split up," Daniel suggested. "Except I have no idea how to do that seal thing."

"Nor should you, in any case," Shirogane said firmly. "That's too much energy for a new shin to handle."

_So Akira's been a shin a while. Interesting. _

"One of us alone can't seal the larger tears… but we could locate them, and seal the smaller ones." Shirogane's gaze met the archaeologist's, level and assured. "It would help."

_He knows_, Daniel realized. _He knows I want to get Akira alone to ask questions._

"You should stay with Daniel," Shirogane said, turning to Akira. "He has resolve, but he doesn't know how kokuchi fight. And he doesn't seem to quite understand how little hold gravity has on us."

"Yes," Akira nodded.

_He knows_, Daniel reflected as they parted ways. _And he's okay with that._

Which meant one of two things. Either Akira didn't know anything damaging….

Or Shirogane trusted him. Completely.

Daunting thought. Daniel _knew_ that kind of trust. It had to go both ways. And Akira was a _teenager_. What kind of seventeen-year-old trusted _any_ adult completely?

And… why did the world feel odd, all of a sudden?

"Huh," Akira murmured. Caught Daniel's look of alarm, and gave him a reassuring shrug. "Not a tear. The boundary's just thin here." The teen hesitated, suddenly wary.

_Shy_, Daniel realized. _This is something he doesn't share with strangers… so, there_ aren't _many strange shin. How small a group are they?_

"You should take a look," Akira said at last. "You've never seen anything like it."

_After being to dozens of worlds? I kind of doubt it._ But Daniel took the offered hand. "So what do we do?"

"Just follow me," Akira said practically. "Try to remember how it feels, in case you have to get out on your own." The teen looked forward again, but didn't move. Just frowned slightly, concentrating….

It was like pressing against warm water. Like asking a membrane to let you through. The world around them seemed to bend, stretch-

And they were walking in carved caverns, lit foxfire-green with odd patches of moss, and Akira's hand was stopping him from drawing the whip. Stray kokuchi glanced at them, or simply flew by, as if they were of no more interest than passing clouds.

_What. The. Heck?_

Even more unsettling than the shift in their surroundings, was the change in the air. It felt _light_. Easy to breathe. Like he'd been existing off a tank's recycled air, and only now broken the surface to inhale. "This is the shadow world?"

"Part of it." Akira's steps seemed even lighter than usual, as if some of the weight of looming disaster had lifted from his shoulders. "Let's walk here a while. We can check for tears just as easily on this side, if we don't go too far."

"So why not stay here to check the SGC?" Daniel asked, trying to sound casual. For people as secretive as Shirogane implied, that _had_ to be a safer way.

"Distance isn't the same here." Still walking, Akira frowned. "Those aren't the right words… the way we cover distance isn't the same. On the light side - you've seen me jump. Gravity doesn't drag on us like humans, but we're still bound by _where things are_. Here… that's a little negotiable."

"And you thought _Shirogane_ sounded crazy?" Daniel murmured. Spatial location was _negotiable?_ Boy, he hoped Sam never stumbled in here. Her head might explode.

"I can't help it if it sounds crazy!" Akira flushed. "It's how things _work_ here."

"Different subsets of the dimensions of the superstrings might have completely different physical laws extant," Daniel mused. "Guess Sam's right about that one, too." He caught Akira's stunned look. "Ah, superstrings are-"

"I know what they are," Akira said abruptly.

_Whoa. Not your average teen- _

"Why do you think that applies?"

_Really,_ really _not your average teen_. "Sam's an astrophysicist," Daniel evaded the question. "She talks about odd possible phenomena all the time. We've actually run into a lot of them." He waved a hand at their bizarre surroundings. "So if you say the laws of physics are different here - well, that's what I thought of." _And something made you think of it, too. What?_

But Akira was silent, moving through the caverns like a wraith. Though an oddly happy wraith; the normal teenage scowl had softened into a faint, relieved smile, which seemed to have nothing to do with the oddly peaceful behavior of kokuchi mending tiny tears.

_I wonder what you're smiling about…._

------------

_I missed this place_, Akira realized, shaken by the sudden flood of - it _couldn't_ be homesickness. He'd only been on this side to fight other shin, or rescue people. He couldn't _want_ to be here. Much less feel like-

_Home. This is home. _

Not here specifically, but - it was like coming back to his own neighborhood, after being outside of Tokyo entirely. Even the kokuchi didn't startle him here. Why should they?

_It's our world. There won't be trouble, unless someone else starts it. _

And oh, for one instant of longing he wanted to leave everything behind, climb through these tunnels to open air, and feel the night wind sing, shot with black diamond stars….

"Are you okay?"

_Can't leave Daniel behind. He'll get in trouble. Worse than I did_. Not to mention, the man's friends were still in danger. "Fine," Akira said thickly, keeping his face turned away until he could surreptitiously swipe at his cheeks. "It's just… it's always new here."

_I'm shin. This is my world, too. When this is over - I'll find time. I'll get Shirogane to show me everything._

Which would likely suit the shadow king down to his flirting smile. Shirogane _loved_ watching him be surprised. As if he needed more proof that all shin were crazy-

_No. Oh, no._ The feeling in the air was different from meeting her in the world of light, but unmistakable.

"Akira-kun!"

A pink-haired, giggling, black-dressed whirlwind; Akira dodged, particularly careful to sidestep lace-topped breasts. _And I was wondering how things could get worse._ "Lulu, what are you doing here?"

"Looking for where my kokuchi went!" The bubbly shin - she _looked_ fifteen, but Akira suspected she was much, _much_ older - batted her eyelashes at him. And sparkled. "Oh, goody! You took that awful seal off."

"Um, Lulu-"

"Who wants to stay on _that_ side, anyway?" Lulu sniffed. "Living like a human. That's crazy!"

"Lulu!" He didn't dare get close enough to shake her. She could clamp on like a limpet. "We've got tears and a minor invasion on our hands. _Tell_ me you're not involved."

"Of course not!" She looked cutely stubborn… and oddly tired. "I just wanted to see. Lots of kokuchi went away, and I wanted to find out why. And who's he?" She peered past him at Daniel. "Hmm… cute, but older. Not my type. Shirogane picked _him_ for a contract? Not fair!"

"Daniel, Lulu," Akira sighed. "She's an ally." _Sort of. Sometimes._ "So you found the kokuchi. What have you been doing with them?" Lulu might not think it was worthwhile to attack humans, but she wasn't exactly nice.

"Helping!" She gave him a perky grin. "Shirogane-sama wouldn't want all these humans to get eaten. Even if they _really_ deserved it. So I've been telling them not to go through."

_Which means this problem is a_ lot _worse than we thought_, Akira realized. "You should have told Shirogane-"

"I've been busy!" For once, those deep blue eyes dodged his. "And… Shirogane-sama's still mad at me…."

_After you tried to kill us_ how _many times? No kidding._ Lulu had helped them against Homurabi, but only when she thought he might kill her after another failure. Not exactly a stirring renunciation of former villainy.

"Miss?" Daniel put in. "You don't look so good."

"Oh… I'm just a _little_ tired…."

Akira caught her, pressed a hand to her forehead. _Fever_. "Lulu. How long have you been controlling the kokuchi?"

"Um… not sure?"

"Too long," Akira stated grimly. Even for a shin, she was too light. _What do I do? Shirogane taught me how to heal small things, but this feels serious. Like something-_

Oh. Of course.

"If we let her borrow a doppleganger, Janet can treat her," Daniel said, worried. "Janet's our doctor-"

"Human doctors?" Lulu wrinkled her nose. "Yuck!"

"She's rude, but she's right," Akira admitted. "I'm not sure a regular doctor could help. But I know someone who can." He picked Lulu up, ignoring her woozy but delighted squeal. _I've never done this before…._

Well. There had to be a first time for everything.

"Daniel. Grab onto me, and hold tight."

Picture a bar, and red stools, and a warm, comforting atmosphere he now knew was half due to various rei wards. Feel at the shadows, until part of them matched. _I want to be… there!_

Will wrapped in shadows, he walked. Dark, and dark, and light….

They stepped into the hubbub of the Aging bar's main room, barely dodging a giggling waitress as she brought over a round of drinks. "What the-?" Daniel yelped.

"Oh, no!" Lulu wailed. "Not him!"

"Be quiet," Akira ordered, still reeling. _It worked. It worked!_

…_Ow._

Collapse later. Help Lulu now. "Master! Shuichi-san!"

"Mayu, look after the bar," the dark-haired bartender directed, coming out from behind the counter. "There's something I need to tend to in the back room."

Relieved, Akira dodged through the boisterous night crowd, a bemused archaeologist trailing in his wake. Slipped into the back, and laid a muzzily protesting Lulu down on a futon. "Shuichi-san, Daniel Jackson… Lulu's been keeping kokuchi from going through a lot of tears. I don't know for how long."

"Not _that_ long!" Lulu said hotly. "I've controlled them _lots_ longer than this!"

"Not when you were already weakened," Shuichi said firmly, checking forehead, then pulse. "Try to relax. This is going to hurt a bit-"

"Ow! Meanie! _Ow!_ Akira-kun, save meeee…."

"Try to ignore the screaming," Akira advised, hanging back near the aghast archaeologist. "Master's very good at healing. Especially supernatural wounds."

"He's-"

"Blind. Yes," Akira nodded. "But he can sense us."

"I was going to ask, is he another shin?"

"No. He's-" _the only living king of the rei_ "-An adept. Someone who can perceive us, and shape shadows or light in ways most humans can't."

Shuichi's brows flicked up slightly, over his usual kind smile. "So you and Shirogane rescued another one, hmm?"

"Er. It's a long story?" Daniel tried.

"It always is."

Shuichi bent back over Lulu, and Daniel took the chance to grab Akira's shoulder. "Where _are_ we?"

"Tokyo," Akira said, surprised.

"But - we were - oh, boy." Daniel kneaded his head as if it hurt.

_Huh. I thought only Shirogane got that reaction out of people. _

Speaking of… he was starting to have a little more sympathy for Shirogane leaving him in the dark so much. Just a little. Knowing what he now knew about shin and rei, and what might happen if the ordinary world learned of them - well. He didn't feel inclined to tell Daniel everything at once, either.

"Tokyo," Daniel groaned, shaking his head. "And you didn't even use a 'Gate."

Shuichi's shoulders stiffened, and he pressed one of Lulu's nerves. Yelping, she passed out cold. "This is more serious than I thought," he said levelly. "Akira, I may need you to restrain Lulu if she wakes. Daniel? On the third floor, first room on the right, there is a black lacquer box, ornamented with ravens, about this big." He sketched dimensions in the air. "Could you bring it down? I may need some of those tools."

"…All right."

Shuichi waited until the door had closed, then beckoned Akira close enough to whisper. "It's as Shirogane feared, then. The gate of stars is open?"

"So he says," Akira nodded. "I don't think I've seen it."

"You'd know if you had." Shuichi felt Lulu's forehead again, and sighed. "She's spent so much energy… the tears are very bad then. Yet the gate isn't recorded as affecting the boundary. What's going on?"

"We're not sure yet. But Daniel knows something," Akira said, certain. "He just doesn't trust us enough yet to say it." He frowned. "What's wrong with Lulu?"

"Homurabi is dead."

"I noticed," Akira said wryly. "Ryuko died, and Kou was okay-"

"_Okay_ isn't quite accurate. He was wounded deeply. But Ryuko's inshi survived, so his contract still stands," Shuichi informed him. "Homurabi was _destroyed_. And she hasn't approached Shirogane to be bound to him."

"She may not know she needs to," Akira said, suddenly troubled. "When we first met, she said I looked as if I knew more than she did… I don't think she has the memories."

"And you do, now," Shuichi murmured. "Good. Give me your hand." From out of nowhere, he produced a shimmering knife. "I need some of your blood."

Akira flinched, but didn't pull away. He let Shuichi nick him, and hold his hand so a few glowing blue drops fell on the pink-haired shin's lips. "What are we doing?"

"You may be young, but you're a strong shin, with a solid link to Shirogane. This will help support her until a king can take her under his protection again." Shuichi tilted his head as Lulu unconsciously licked the blood away. "Hmm. No fangs."

Gods, the man sounded _disappointed_. "You were _expecting_ fangs?" Akira said in disbelief.

…Then again, Kou had fangs. And Shirogane… you wouldn't think they could hide in that flirtatious smile, but…. Akira flushed, recalling lips on his skin as Shirogane sucked venom from his body.

"It makes things a little harder if she doesn't have them," Shuichi said practically. "I suppose she's not used to draining dark energy."

"She drains people with her whip," Akira pointed out.

"That's combat. It's much more indiscriminate. This is… well, nourishment. After a fashion."

"So what makes us different?" Akira wondered. "Lulu and I, and you-"

Shuichi smiled at him. With almost as much mischief as Shirogane.

"…I shouldn't assume, huh?"

"No, you shouldn't," Shuichi nodded. "Lulu likely doesn't have them because she was never taught to. You don't, because you haven't yet chosen to need them. If Shirogane had ever needed to feed you the way I need you to support Lulu now… we are creatures of energy as much as flesh. Our bodies answer to our will. And they are vulnerable, when that will is exhausted." He felt Lulu's pulse again. "That should do. If we can get her to rest."

A thoughtful silence. Akira eyed the rei as he healed the small wound, nerving himself to ask. "You're not surprised."

"That you broke the seal? No," Shuichi admitted. "Some take better to the change than others. If I didn't know you were originally a rei, I'd swear you were born shin. You sing of night's shadows." He laid a hand on Akira's arm. "And yet under it all, there's still a counterpoint of dawn, and light. Part of you _is_ still rei. I've never sensed anything like it before. It gives me hope."

"Hope?" Akira frowned, puzzled.

Shuichi weighed him in that unseeing regard. "You are close to her. Would you be offended, if I offered Aya the chance to become my child?"

"Offended? No!" Gods, no; Aya was a demon of a fighter as an adept. Akira could only imagine what she'd do with a rei's power. It took his breath away. "But she doesn't have an inshi."

"Not yet," Shuichi said plainly. "From what Shirogane and I have observed with you - we think we may have found a way to change that. At least for adepts."

And there were far more adepts than anyone with inshi. The possibilities…. Akira nodded. "If she's willing."

"You know we wouldn't change someone who wasn't." A quiet chuckle. "Even Shirogane asked permission, did he not?"

It'd been choose or die - but still, that _was_ a choice. "Hope?" Akira asked again. Because he felt it himself. Incredible, _dizzying_ hope. And he didn't know why.

"Homurabi was the death of many," Shuichi said somberly. "Rei and shin, our numbers are too few to keep the worlds in order. And those with inshi are all too rare. If we can _form_ an inshi within adepts-" He spread open hands, offering the possibility.

Akira nodded, fiercely interested. "Kengo?"

"There's enough darkness in him. Shirogane is almost certain it will work, to create a dark inshi," Shuichi nodded. "You'll have the comrades you need, Akira-kun."

"…I don't understand."

"It's not natural for a king's child to be alone," Shuichi said, serious. "Part of Lulu's illness is, simply, loneliness."

Akira shook his head in protest. "I've _always_ been alone-"

"A shin cannot be. As a rei cannot," Shuichi stated. "We need our counterparts. And we need our comrades. Under the seal, you could live as a human - but even then, I know part of you longed for our presence. As you have needed Shirogane, since he changed you."

"That's not true," Akira muttered, recalling too many mornings waking to silver hair in the same bed. Each time, being heart-stoppingly angry - and relieved. And angry _because_ he was relieved; because Shirogane filled a sudden sense of _something missing_ within him, something that had never _been_ missing before his life had changed….

"Deny it if you wish, Akira," Shuichi said gently. "You know it's true. You've taken up your power again, as is your right; you _are_ of royal blood, and you are shin. But with it, you must accept what that power requires. Shin. Rei. Comrades. And time in the shadow world, to sustain you when you draw too heavily on your own strength."

_I don't want- _

But this wasn't about what he wanted. This was about what he'd _promised_.

_My king._

He'd meant it then. He meant it now. He wanted the shadows. He _wanted_ to be with Shirogane; saving the world, tending the boundary, discovering all the wonder of places and beings most people would never know existed.

And… even without the shadows, he'd still want to be with Shirogane. Annoying, flirtatious, mysterious to the point of driving him insane - still. The shin was his _friend_.

"I don't want to be alone again," Akira whispered.

Shuichi inclined his head. "Not easy to admit, hmm?"

If there had been one hint of a laugh in his tone… but there wasn't. "I- Shirogane's crazy sometimes, but- I don't want this to be just not wanting to be alone!"

"It's not," Shuichi said firmly. "If it were, you'd be clinging to Kou. Or Aya. Or Kengo-"

Akira snorted.

"Well, maybe not Kengo," Shuichi admitted, obviously thinking of the loyal (but sometimes _incredibly_ dense) teenager. "I wonder what's taking Daniel so long?"

Akira frowned, reaching out with his senses for the presence of another shin….

------------

_I should call Jack._ Lacquer box in hand, Daniel regarded the telephone one last time. _Let him know where I am, what's going on… monsters in the SGC, and I'm in_ Tokyo. _Gods._

He should call. But he wasn't.

Sighing, Daniel headed downstairs, and handed over the box to a frowning Akira. "Just tell me. Is it contagious?"

"Contagious?" Shuichi shook his head, accepting the box from Akira. "Lulu's only exhausted. I'll realign her chi, and see to it she rests."

"We should get back-" Akira started.

Shuichi held up a finger. "Take a few minutes for yourself before you go. You bore the brunt of the passage, but Daniel's not used to shadow-walking. And take longer to return, so you can restore yourself as you travel. Getting back to Shirogane faster won't help if you can't fight." He nodded toward the next room. "There are drinks in the refrigerator, and Mayu won't see you."

"Good," Akira said fervently. Glanced at Daniel. "Duck if you see her. She likes cute older guys - and she's got a grip like an _octopus_."

"But, people can't see-" Daniel put a few facts together. "She's a sensitive?"

"Very," Shuichi sighed. "You're lucky the bar was so crowded, she missed you come in. And that Shirogane wasn't with you. I swear, she can _smell_ that poor man."

"Poor man?" Daniel sputtered.

"You've never tried to pry her off." Akira shuddered. "Ugh! She's Kengo's _sister_. How can she think I'd… never mind."

"Kengo?" Daniel asked, following Akira into the next room; a small kitchenette, looked like.

"I've known him since we started school," Akira shrugged, grabbing a bottle of something that looked like green tea out of the fridge. "I couldn't _date_ his _sister_."

"Of course not," Daniel agreed, bemused. Accepted a drink, and glanced around. "If no one's going to see us here…."

Akira nodded, dropping his doppleganger to the floor. Stepped on it-

Light washed over him, blazing black hair brown, and red eyes to a green-tinted gray. The odd outfit shimmered, reforming into blue jeans and a long-sleeved, burnt-orange shirt.

_But the collar and earring stay_, Daniel saw. _Huh_. Took a deep breath, and stepped on his own ridiculous doll.

It was like pins and needles, all over. It didn't hurt - but it was _heavy_.

_No. This is normal, not heavy. I was just so light… oh. Good. Me again._ Daniel fingered SGC green fatigues. _Except-_ "Um. You didn't turn on the lights." But it wasn't dark in here. Which was really not right.

Akira glanced up at the dark fixture, startled. "I forgot." Gave him a shy look. "I don't know how that works, either. I just - don't have trouble seeing in the dark, anymore."

Okay. So, chalk another one up in the weirdness column. _And while he's willing to talk…._ "You know, there's a phone upstairs."

Akira went still.

"I should have called the SGC," Daniel said levelly. "I've called up people in _Antarctica_ when I had to; Japan isn't a problem. And my friends are in danger. I _should_ have called." He paused. "But I didn't."

Akira kept a steady gaze on him, but he could see the kid sweat. Just a _little_.

"If I called, the SGC would have people going over your life with a fine-toothed comb. And if they knew about shin on top of that - if the Goa'uld can hurt you, we can, too. And… I _couldn't hurt you_." Slow breath. Stay calm. "Please tell me you know why."

Akira sighed, and leaned against the small counter. "Yes."

Daniel waited.

"I hold your contract. Like Shirogane holds mine. You're… drawn to the shin you're bound to. You don't want to hurt them." Akira gave him a wry smile. "Doesn't mean you can't. I've punched out Shirogane. When he was being an _idiot_."

Okay, that was somewhat comforting. And nerve-wracking, having his suspicions confirmed. "So how'd you get away with striking a high lord?" Daniel asked neutrally. He might not know Japanese well enough to be comfortable, but he knew what -_sama_ meant.

Akira let out a slow breath. "King," he said bluntly. "Shirogane is a king."

_Oh boy. _

"I remember how frustrated I was," Akira said, looking into memory. "We were rushing from one disaster to the next, risking our lives, and Shirogane would ask me to _trust_ him. And I tried. But when I didn't _know_… sometimes, it was hard." He glanced at Daniel. "Years ago, there were two kings of the shin. Shirogane, and Homurabi."

"Were?" Daniel asked uneasily.

"Homurabi decided he wanted to be the only power in the shadows," Akira said levelly. "He ordered the shin bound to him to attack Shirogane; he thought they'd killed him. Homurabi himself attacked Shirogane's allies. And he did kill many of them. Shirogane… fled to this side. Which was risky. Very risky."

_Shirogane-sama's still mad at me_, she'd said. "Lulu is one of Homurabi's shin," Daniel realized.

"Was," Akira nodded. "That's why she's ill. We destroyed Homurabi. And she's been avoiding all of us, so we couldn't help her."

"You mean killed," Daniel said bluntly.

"You've never seen a shin die," Akira said, unfazed. "_Destroyed_ is the best word." A frustrated shrug. "When Shirogane found me, he was still weak; from the attack, and from hiding on the light side so long. He didn't want to risk me running into an ambush, if I found out everything and panicked. Not that running would have helped, Homurabi would have hunted me down just for being one of Shirogane's children… anyway. Shirogane kept things from me, because the world was at stake. What Homurabi planned for humans - you don't want to know."

"I've dealt with Goa'uld," Daniel said dryly. "I think I can guess."

Akira nodded, granting that. "Homurabi is gone, and that war is over. If we can fix what's happening in your mountain, the world should be safe." He grimaced. "Or safer. With the 'Gate open-"

"-Nowhere's really safe," Daniel finished. "I kind of hear a _but_ in there."

"Homurabi and his children killed many shin, and many of our allies," Akira said bluntly. "You don't know us, so you don't trust us. Fine. We don't know you, either. But Shirogane and I? We're _all the help you've got_."

Truth. Daniel could see it in gray eyes.

_If they can't handle it, we're on our own. Up against things most of us can't see, and can't fight. Things that can possess us, and make us kill each other. _

And it was more than that. By telling him this much - by _trusting_ him this much - Akira had thrown down the gauntlet.

_This is what I know. This is what we can do. What will_ you _do?_

All too familiar. He'd seen it before on Chulak, when a certain colonel had faced a First Prime of Apophis. "You remind me of Jack," Daniel mused.

"Jack, who doesn't believe in ghosts," Akira said wryly.

"That Jack, yes." Daniel hesitated, considering. _He's still not telling me everything._

But if there had been a war… if Akira had _already_ been part of killing one shin bent on world domination….

Yeah. The kid didn't have reason to trust him with everything. Yet.

Daniel sighed. "Look. I don't have solid proof, but there's a machine in Sam's lab…."


	3. Chapter 3

"So you're the source of this madness," Shirogane murmured, eyes narrowed as he stalked through the lab behind the oblivious hosts. The Goa'uld were shadows within their shadows, and Shirogane's fingers itched to reach in and _yank_-

_Nothing drastic. Yet. I promised. _

Loathe the Goa'uld as he did, the device was the greater danger. Darkness clung to it like shreds of cobweb. It was a wonder the whole lab hadn't been swallowed up.

_They built some kind of buffer_, Shirogane judged, studying the boundary nearby. He might not know how to use Goa'uld technology, but he'd seen its effects. _They're pushing into the shadows_ here, _but the force ripples, and tears the boundary elsewhere._

Whatever they'd meant it to do, it apparently was a failure, judging by the ill-tempered discussion the two Tok'ra were having with a rather pretty blonde military scientist. But that such a device existed at all- Shirogane shuddered, chilled.

"This isn't working," the blonde announced abruptly.

"Sam-" one of the Tok'ra began.

"I'll be in my _office_, Martouf. I need to _think_."

_Ah. A distraction_. Smiling to himself, Shirogane opened one of the device's access panels, and started looking for important pieces.

_The Goa'uld thought themselves safe, because humans have no naqadah within them_, Shirogane recalled, smile wry. _Silly_.

After all, you didn't have to be able to _use_ technology, in order to _break_ it.

_Breaking it without visible outward signs, that's the tricky part…._

Touched by darkness, a backup control circuit puffed into smoke. Something modern humans might call a capacitor was carefully extracted, and tucked into one of Shirogane's pockets.

"You can think here," Martouf tried.

"No," Sam said flatly, "I can't."

"The principles are sound," the other Tok'ra argued. "The device works-"

"First off, Aldwin, I'm not even sure you've told me what all the principles _are_. Second, if you say it works - things only disappearing for a few seconds, and coming back thermally excited, aren't what any of us had in mind." Sam stared him down. "Unless there's something you're not telling us?"

_Ah, a key power conduit._ Shirogane removed what he could, and seared what he couldn't. _Let's see. Is there anything else…._

"Whatever's upset you, we can deal with," Martouf started.

_"Back. Off."_

_She's dangerously steeped in darkness_. Shirogane frowned, waving a hand to ripple damaging shadow through the machine's very substance. _As is he. This could be bad._

"Just - go through the equations again!" Sam stomped out the door. "Something's wrong. And if you don't find it, I will!"

"Sam!"

"Let her go," Aldwin murmured. "Tau'ri lose their temper quickly, but they're as swift to forget." A _hmph_. "Children."

_Not all of us._ Shirogane's hands tightened on his cane, hearing the hated tongue. It might not have the reverberation the System Lords used with every breath, but those words were the Goa'uld as much as the host. Their shadows were too synchronized for the human to be objecting.

_How can anyone so loathe what they once were?_

Then again, if he'd known anyone could so drown sanity in contempt, he might have avoided the disaster that had been Homurabi.

_I should have waited. Even if it left the boundary unstable for a time. I should have been sure, before I chose a new king. _

But every rei and shin had believed the boundary was the most important thing in creation. That leaving the king's position unfilled was not just negligent, but insane.

_And he hid his nature so very well_. Shirogane gritted his teeth. _I won't be fooled so again_.

One king of the shin, one of the rei. It was enough to keep the boundary intact, if not entirely steady.

_And this time, I will wait. Until Akira is ready_.

"If she'd just take another of us to blend with, she'd understand," Martouf said bleakly.

_Another? She was a host before?_ Shirogane's breath hissed. That explained the darkness inside her. Hosts they'd saved in the past - such a violation drew darkness like moths to flame.

"If this works, we will finally be able to destroy all the System Lords, in one blow," Aldwin said firmly. "And then she will see whose side she should favor. Be patient. Just a little longer."

_Oh, I'm going to enjoy this_. Shirogane cracked his knuckles as Martouf brushed Aldwin off and stormed out the door. He hadn't haunted anyone who deserved it this much in years.

Start small. A shift of a glass of water, inches away from where Aldwin's reaching hand expected it to be. Wait for just the right moment, and puff a startling breath on the back of the vulnerable neck….

The resulting jump, splash, and startled swearing were music to his ears.

_Now, what to toy with next-_

With all the lingering darkness, he almost missed the prickle in his senses. But years on the run from Homurabi had its benefits; reflex brought his cane up and around, _struck_-

_Damn. There's a lot of them._

So. Whatever Akira and Daniel had found, that had drawn them to slip into the shadow world and _away_ - it must have been powerful.

_Lulu, perhaps? I thought I sensed her near. And she controls kokuchi better than most shin. _

Which was part of why he'd left her to her own devices. Any shin with such a power had to _choose_ to use it properly. Left alone, and apparently unwatched, and she'd have the chance to prove she deserved to remain shin. Or not.

Whatever the cause, he could feel the chill of kokuchi flooding in. Not just to this lab, but throughout this fortress-

Reeling from an unseen blow, Aldwin grabbed his arm, and stared wide-eyed at bloody fingers.

_I have a duty to protect those here, _Shirogane decided. _Even if two of them are Tok'ra_.

After all, he could always kill them later.

A dark blade clipped his hair, and Aldwin bolted.

Shirogane smiled. And threw himself into the fray, striking with speed and strength that would have left even Kengo slack-jawed with amazement.

_The strength of a king._

He gloried in it; the power Homurabi had robbed him of, that Akira and his comrades had fought so hard to reclaim. Let the kokuchi come. They'd never pull him down.

_Come back soon, Akira. You're missing a wonderful fight…._

------------

"Another day, another alien invasion," Siler muttered, smacking a flying black lizard with the biggest, meanest wrench in his toolbox. It reeled away, shrieking; hissed, and came back for more.

_Wish I had a zat. _

Only some of the security he'd run into _did_ have zats, and they were having even less luck. To zat the things, you had to _see_ the things - and even with people being slashed to pieces, half the guys couldn't see _anything_. Or hear anything, either - and the way these things screamed….

_Nightmare. Goddamned nightmare.  
_

A swing too slow, and fangs sank into his arm. Cold; so cold it burned….

Something _cracked_, whip-sharp, and his attacker burst into sparks.

"Bastards!" A young man's voice, focused and angry. "Try someone who can fight back!"

…And whatever that venom was, it had to spawn hallucinations, because there was a teenage Goth vampire carving up shadows like they were standing still. Not to mention Dr. Jackson, snapping a whip like the Nazi relic-hunters would be coming around the corner any minute.

"You okay, Sergeant?" Dr. Jackson grimaced, lashing out at another shadow. "Damn, you're not, and you can't even hear me-"

"Dr. Jackson?" Siler blurted out.

"Whoa. You can see us?"

"Sensitive," the teenager bit out between blows, moving with impossible speed. "It's why the kokuchi want _him_ most. Stay with him!"

And he leapt right into the thick of them.

Siler gulped. "Everybody, _cease fire!_"

Thank god for fast reflexes and military discipline. The shooting stopped, and guys fell back around his position. "What's going on, Sergeant?" one of the few airmen who _could_ see their enemies asked. "They're pulling back. Likes something's after them-"

"We got a friendly in there," Siler said fast. "He is friendly, right, Dr. Jackson?"

Everybody else _stared_ at him.

"I don't think they can see me," Dr. Jackson said ruefully. "But yes, Akira's here to help. Hang on a second." He did something, and color flashed across him.

And a half-dozen weapons jerked his way. "Dr. Jackson?" someone yelped.

"Long story," the archaeologist stated. "Short version - we punched a hole to another dimension, and a lot of the locals are nasty. But some of them like humans, and they came to help." He pointed where shrieking dark lizards were being shredded into sparkling red motes. "That's Akira. If you can't see him, please don't shoot that way. I don't think he's immune to bullets."

Siler grimaced, holding his bleeding, freezing arm. "Akira, as in Nikadou, as in-"

"The security alert. Yeah." Dr. Jackson gave them a rueful smile. Which faded into horror, as the archaeologist saw glittering black trace outwards from his wound. "Akira! Are these things poisonous?"

"Very!" came the yell back down the corridor.

"You didn't say so before!"

"I told you not to get bitten!"

"Not _me_," Dr. Jackson groaned. Swallowed hard, seeing the number of wounded.

"We've got to get the doc up here," Siler gritted out.

"No," Dr. Jackson said, oddly firm. "We've got to get everybody _here_ down to Janet. The kokuchi are going to keep attacking us, and Akira's the only one of us who can really hit them and keep them down."

Evacuation under fire. Made sense. "You heard the man." Siler switched his wrench to his left hand. "Let's move!"

A last, spiraling scream, and the corridor was empty of enemies. For now. The teenager stood there a moment, just breathing; straightened, blades vanishing, and headed back toward them. Only to freeze, instants before he would have stepped in splattered blood. "Gods…."

"Akira?" Dr. Jackson looked worried, the same as he would for anyone in the SGC. "Are you okay?"

"We usually get to the kokuchi before they can do… this." Akira swallowed, face pale, ruby eyes flicking from blood to the airmen lifting injured comrades. "This is bad."

"I know," Dr. Jackson said quietly. "Just stay with us, okay? The faster we move, the faster they get help. We can all freak out later."

"I know," Akira said abruptly, and Siler could hear the anger being used to cover horror.

_The kid's a combat veteran. How the hell did that happen? _

Akira leapt past the blood, touching down by them light as shadow. "Shirogane would suck the venom out, but I don't think that's the right thing to do for a human. Even one who can see us. The venom's solid in a shin-" His face lit suddenly, like Major Carter having an _aha!_

And his fingers dove into Siler's arm like water. "Hey!" Siler yelped.

Akira pulled back, glittering black oozing in his grasp. And the bite looked - normal. Deep, bloody, and painful as hell, but normal.

Venom sizzling into golden nothingness, Akira grinned. "Better?"

"Doc Fraiser," Siler got out, "is gonna love you, kid."

"She should have at least sent a medic our way," Dr. Jackson said, troubled. "Can anyone raise the infirmary?"

"Just got them, and-" The man on the radio blanched. "Dr. Fraiser's attacking the patients!"

------------

It made perfect sense. Of course it did. Belson wouldn't give her the answers? Then she'd find them the hard way. The way she'd had to so many times since joining the SGC. Too many times.

If his mouth wouldn't give her the truth, his body would.

All she had to do was cut, and cut, until everything became clear. Well, that, and shake off Security and her orderlies. They didn't want her to find the answers. Traitors! How dared they? Didn't they know that without answers, they could all die? Didn't they know Daniel was _missing?_

A zat's tingling pain washed over her, and Janet snarled.

Huh. She wasn't falling.

There had to be an answer to that, too.

Decided, she laid the scalpel along her wrist-

"No! Janet, stop!"

Janet started, blinking as if to clear away fog. "Daniel?" But that couldn't be. Daniel was missing. That was why she'd done all this. All these… horrible things….

"Janet." Daniel had his hands up for calm, despite wide eyes. "I know you're upset. Confused. Just - put the scalpel down. Please."

"You were _missing_," Janet said, miffed. "I had to find answers. I _always_ have to find answers. Even if they're crazy."

"Keep her talking." A barely-heard whisper from nowhere. "Try to calm her down. Remind her of positive things. Happy ones."

Daniel nodded slightly. "Janet, Cassie's waiting for you. Remember? She'll be glad to see both of us."

_Cassie._ Her daughter's face shone through the clouds in her mind, and the scalpel fell from nerveless fingers. "Daniel?"

Something _yanked_ through her, like a thousand morning-afters crashing down at once. Janet staggered.

Faint and far off, something shrieked in deadly agony. And was silent.

"Oh my god," Janet breathed, horrified. Nurses had been scattered like tenpins, Security still had zats trained on her, and Lieutenant Belson was huddled terrified and bleeding in a corner. "Oh my god, what have I done?"

"It wasn't your fault," Daniel said quickly. "It _wasn't_, Janet, you were possessed. It wasn't you. Not the real you."

"But I-" She couldn't say it.

"We need your help," Daniel said bluntly. "Right here, right now."

Seeing the wounded, bleeding soldiers being hauled through her doors, Janet swallowed. And nodded. But she still had to _know_. "Daniel, where were you?"

"Trying to stop this," Daniel said grimly, picking up the phone. "Just listen while I tell the general."

------------

"The Reetou didn't do this much damage," Jack griped, firing again. And again. And saw the damn shadow-lizards bend _around_ the zat bolt, which was patently Not Fair.

"The Reetou had limited numbers, and were visible to all with the proper technology." Teal'c opened up with his staff weapon. And for once, Jack couldn't complain about its lousy accuracy. The way these things moved, sometimes you were better off _not_ aiming.

If, of course, you could see the damn things at all. A bunch of the SGC just _couldn't_. And if they couldn't see it, they could shoot straight _at_ it, and somehow the bullet or blast just zipped on through. Which made _no sense at all_ - except he'd seen it happen.

Worse luck, not being able to see them didn't seem to stop the _creatures'_ blows from hitting home. Not fair. At all.

And loose somewhere in all this mess was a kid whose mother hadn't even realized he was missing. Worse, one who didn't seem to _care_.

"What do you mean, he'll _show up?_" Jack had finally said in disbelief, after Research and NORAD had turned up Mrs. Akane Nikaidou's cell phone number.

"He knows our departure date." The woman's voice had been reserved and calm, her English just slightly awkward. "He is very responsible, when it matters. When it is time, he will be present."

"Ma'am, I'm not sure you understand the gravity of the situation," Jack had replied dryly. "Your son is _missing_. Inside a _secure facility_."

"He is most certainly not. What reason would he have to be in such a place? You have nothing to do with law."

"Only with protecting it, ma'am." Jack knuckled his forehead, not sure he believed what he was hearing. "You're saying your teenage son would be more interested in poking around an American courtroom than watching the flying satellites?"

"Interest? It is what is _proper_." Her voice wasn't cold. Just distracted, as if there were a dozen more important things on her mind than where her son was. "If you will excuse me, Colonel, I have business to conduct."

And with that, she'd hung up.

He'd stared at the phone, jaw dropped. Shared an incredulous look with Teal'c, who'd been reading what Research had dredged up on the kid. It might be way after-hours in Japan, but someone had, maybe, poked into a few computers the Japanese government might not want them poking into. So they now had a reasonable, if sketchy, background for one Akira Nikaidou, seventeen, student at Kiriba Private High School. Father one Jason Baker, deceased; mother Akane Nikaidou, lead corporate lawyer for the international mega-corporation Midori. Highly paid lawyer, at that, which did not do wonders for Jack's gut. School records weren't all online, but there was enough to see that Akira held records as both most AWOL student of the school _and_ one of the top five scorers. In what apparently was _not_ a school for slackers.

Which crystallized in Jack's head as _troublemaker_, _smart_, and _bored stiff_. And if the kid _knew_ his Mom wanted him to be a lawyer - and kids generally were clued into that kind of thing - and, oh, say, _didn't_ think power suits and bending ethics were the neatest thing since sliced bread….

Well. He and Teal'c had pretty much agreed that if, say, they'd had a seventeen-year-old Carter in this situation, or god forbid, a seventeen-year-old Daniel….

If you wanted to completely, absolutely, _utterly_ derail your family's plan for your life as a corporate lawyer, going missing in the middle of NORAD should do it.

Not that it was a _good_ plan. But hey, seventeen. Melodrama wasn't just an option, it was a biological necessity.

Assuming, of course, that what had gone missing in NORAD was a seventeen-year-old kid. Either Akira was _way_ more tech-oriented than the records showed, coming up with an invisibility device even Carter hadn't thought of, or…. Well. As, ah, _focused_ as Mrs. Nikaidou was, Jack would bet a Goa'uld could fool her into thinking it was still her son.

Which he and Teal'c had been debating for and against, right up until the alarms sounded and the SGC went berserk.

Lo and behold, the worst mess seemed to be near Sam's lab. Why did that _not_ surprise him?

And they couldn't find Sam or Martouf. Though Aldwin had turned up - bleeding, babbling about invisible monsters, and hair all but standing on end. None of which made for a happy colonel.

"They come," Teal'c warned those who couldn't see monsters.

Jack nodded. "Let 'em get close enough to be sure-"

Sam's door blew open.

Lizard-things recoiled, like sighting a snake. One _stopped_ in midair, squirming like a worm on a hook before it burst into red sparks.

"The heck?" Jack muttered.

More dying creatures. More flying sparks. And suddenly, the big, bad shadow-lizards were _running_.

"I believe we have assistance," Teal'c said thoughtfully.

"Maybe," Jack said darkly. "If that's one of the things that took Daniel-"

"O'Neill." Teal'c's tone was deliberately calming, like a splash of cold water.

"If you are one of those who aided Daniel Jackson, we wish to speak to you openly," the Jaffa said to empty air. "Not all of our forces can clearly perceive the enemy. It would be unfortunate if you were injured by friendly fire."

"Politely put."

Jack jumped, and told hair-trigger reflexes to stand down, damn it. Even if the guy who'd appeared out of thin air looked like he belonged on the front cover of a vampire detective novel.

…Not that he ever _read_ stuff like that. On purpose. You visited Janet's house for a barbecue, you took your chances on accidentally picking up Cassie's latest book-infatuation of the month. When you were looking for the schedule for the hockey game. Honest.

"Of course," the man with the impossible silver braid went on, "you may have observed that what you cannot see, you cannot affect." Both hands leaned lightly on his cane, blue eyes amused behind dark lenses.

_That guy_, Jack thought, suddenly chilled, _could eat Jaffa for breakfast, with a little Tok'ra garnish on the side._

Most Jaffa, anyway. He'd still lay good odds on Teal'c. As long as they could _see_ the guy.

…Which was the point he'd just made. Deliberately. Damn. "Colonel O'Neill, second in command of the SGC," Jack said bluntly. "Who are you, what's going on, and where's Daniel?"

"You may call me Shirogane. Dr. Jackson is… hmm, some levels below us, I think. Helping others deal with the kokuchi. The entities you are fighting." Pale pink lips bent in a wry smile that had nothing in it of humor - and if that wasn't lipstick, Jack would eat that hat. "What is going on, Colonel, is that your people have torn holes to _elsewhere_. And most of its denizens are not fond of this world, or the beings within it."

"You are of this other world," Teal'c stated.

"I am." A graceful incline of the silver head. "Lucky for you, I _do_ like humans."

"Convenient," Jack said dryly.

"Not at all." Bright blue eyes held mischief, and warning. "I would much rather leave you to your fate, than risk my life, and lives of those I care for. But your meddling with the shadows endangers not only those within these walls, but the planet itself. What on _Earth_ were you thinking, taking Goa'uld as your allies? _Any_ Goa'uld? Whatever they may claim, they are children of a Queen like any other… and I do mean _any_ other, Colonel. Before the 'Gate was sealed, Egeria did _not_ stint on the taking of hosts. Or _slaves_."

Now that? Sounded like a _personal_ grudge. And given the Stargate had been sealed _eight thousand years ago_…. "Not human, huh?"

"I?" Dark brows arched over a rueful smile. "I am a shin, Colonel. And we are closer kin than you might think." A graceful, slightly apologetic shrug. "I hope the young lady whose lab this is does not think too harshly of me. There were a great many kokuchi." He started to bow-

"Whoa! Hold it!" Jack jabbed a finger at him. "You are _not_ disappearing on me before we know Danny's okay."

"And Akira Nikaidou, as well," Teal'c added, calm voice holding just a hint of _unfortunately, we are not on Chulak_.

"The faster I can seal the tears, the safer they will both be," Shirogane said plainly. "They're far more safe than you, Colonel. Especially given-" He whirled, head cocked, _listening_. "Ah. That's… not good."

Which had the same nasty flavor as Sam going _oops_. "Say we believe you," Jack stated. "How do we stop this?"

Shirogane weighed Jack in his gaze, and sighed. "If you're determined… leave those who can't see kokuchi behind. They won't be attacked; not if I deliberately draw them to me. To force the kokuchi out of this world, I need to mend the tears. Which would be easier if I had help…."

Again, he listened. But this time, with the kind of rueful smile Jack recognized, from when someone on SG-1 had done something _really stupid_ to save one particular colonel's… mikta.

"Hold your fire," Jack ordered, just before darkness bloomed beside Shirogane. "What the hell is that?"

"Help, I'm afraid." The first person stepped out of the shadows, and Shirogane loosed a torrent of exasperated Japanese.

The twenty-something punk with glasses, and enough ear-piercings to yank him into a magnet, smirked. Then looked slightly sheepish. Which he damn well _ought_ to, Jack was sure, given the rest of the crew was a teenage kid with bleached-blond hair and odd yellow gloves, a girl the same age with stubborn eyes and a weird armlet over her blouse, and a dark-haired thirty-something dressed like an Old West saloon barkeep.

And the girl was _leading_ the barkeep. Whose eyes were shut. "Oh god," Jack groaned. "_Tell_ me the cavalry isn't kids and a blind guy."

"I don't see what you see, true," the bartender replied, English barely accented. "But I can deal with kokuchi."

"Indeed you can. Still. Kou, I'd expect this from." Shirogane eyed the unrepentant punk, who was self-consciously combing brown hair with an odd metal claw on one finger. "But you, Shuichi-san…."

"Akira brought Lulu to me, with word of what was happening here," Shuichi said calmly. "Once she woke and told me how extensive the tears were, I knew you'd need help."

"You should not have brought children to battle," Teal'c said bluntly.

"And I would not, if I had a choice," Shuichi answered. "They're far from defenseless. They can fight kokuchi. Which is far more than most of your allies could ever do." He sighed then, and spoke-

In Goa'uld. People stiffened, but nobody fired.

"He wishes to know what a Jaffa does here, away from those who call themselves gods," Teal'c informed them. "I have renounced the false gods, and work to free my people. How is it you are able to ask? The language of the Goa'uld has not been spoken on Earth for thousands of years."

"Not by most," Shuichi said bluntly. "Some of those you call Tau'ri have long memories." Turning to the girl, he spoke quietly, and received a firm, eager nod. "Shall we go?"

"The kids _stay_," Jack said flatly.

"Don't be an idiot." Kou smirked, accent rougher than the others. "Think you're hot stuff with superweapons? Kokuchi know who can see 'em. Leave the kids, they'll be alone when they get attacked. Hell, they'll probably end up protecting _you_."

Jack was _not_ going to growl. Growling would mean he was in less than perfect control of his temper, and that smug shadow-stepping bastard didn't deserve the satisfaction. But when this was over….

Bleached-Blond jumped into the conversation with a demand Jack couldn't begin to translate, except that it had _Akira_ in there somewhere. And whatever it was, the girl seconded with a worried nod.

"Good question." Kou eyed Shirogane. "So where's my little bro?"

Teal'c frowned. "Akira Nikaidou has no siblings."

"Well, if you want to get _picky_… c'mon, don't you have little bros?" Another glance at Shirogane. "So?"

"Whatever buffer they were able to devise for their device, it's managed to channel most of the tears into two areas," the silver-haired shin replied. "The smaller group is in that direction," Shirogane gestured toward the ceiling, "and we should leave them be for now. The larger ones-"

_"Colonel O'Neill to the 'Gateroom!"_ crackled over the radio.

"I think we can guess," Jack said dryly.

------------

"Tough lady," Akira muttered, slipping out of the infirmary while Dr. Fraiser's back was turned. He was pretty sure she couldn't see shin, but better safe than sorry. The woman had _needles_.

"Janet? Yeah," Daniel nodded, right behind him. He didn't look happy to be back in shin form, but at least he'd seen the point of being able to hit kokuchi harder than any human could. "Why?"

"She's still standing, after we got a parasite out of her," Akira stated, heading for more tears and that _sense_ of Shirogane. "I've only seen one other person do that." Which made him wonder. He hadn't had time to sense her thoroughly, not like Shirogane had with Kengo and Aya a year ago, but what he had felt…. "Do you like her?"

"She's my doctor." Stiff. And more than a little outraged.

Akira groaned in frustration, shaking his head. "I didn't ask if you were dating! It's just - look, people with inshi tend to attract each other, even if they can't consciously sense the energies. And they attract adepts. The _only_ other guy I've seen still conscious after a parasite got yanked out, was an adept." Granted, Kengo had passed out for a few seconds. But Janet hadn't seen him, so he hadn't had to beat her to a bloody pulp to get the kokuchi out.

"Oh." Slightly sheepish. "Why is that?"

_It's one way to find relatives_, Akira almost said. Before he stomped on that memory-chain, hard. Hidden shin and rei were _not_ something he wanted to mention, yet. And neither was what he now realized he knew about how and why shin, rei, and adepts might form alliances. And… closer ties.

_"How did you think you ended up with royal blood in the first place?"_

Telling a so-far reluctant shin that one of his ancestors probably wasn't exactly human - no. Bad idea. "It helps, knowing who your allies might be," Akira said instead.

"Yes, but how does it work?"

"Energy," Akira shrugged. "They're on the right frequency. They… feel… some of the same energies we do."

"Frequencies," Daniel muttered. "Tuners. Focused energies. I have _got_ to talk to Sam-" He almost froze in the corridor. "What was _that?_"

"An inversion," Akira answered, recognizing the distant pressure, and Shirogane's mingled relief, exasperation, and worry. "Another shin - no." That was a shin's level of power, but _not_ another shin. And it felt familiar. "Kou, you idiot!" How could he have come through the shadows? He was rei; even shielded, that _had_ to hurt-

_Think. Who does Kou know who's got enough dark power to help him shadow-walk? More, who would make Shirogane feel like that, just by showing up?_

Kengo. Of. Course.

And if Kengo was here, Aya was too. "I'm going to _kill_ him!"

"Friend of yours?" Daniel said wryly.

"Duct-tape him to a flagpole in his underwear… no, this is Kou, he'd enjoy that too much. Unless it's at an all-boys school, that might work… or maybe I should just slice him into sushi…."

"Good friend," Daniel concluded. "So, he came to help? I thought you said there _wasn't_ any other help."

"He shouldn't have come!" Akira said hotly. "You have _guns_. If _Kou_ gets shot, he'll probably be fine - if any of you can even see him to hit him in the first place. But Kengo and Aya-" He couldn't say it.

"They're human," Daniel finished. Smiled ruefully at his look of shock. "Well, if Kengo's sister is a sensitive…."

Right. Daniel might not have the hang of the shadows, but he wasn't stupid. "I am _going_ to _hurt_ him," Akira bit out. Forced his fingers out of their white-knuckled clench, and took a deep breath. "They're with Shirogane. He'll protect them." _If he can_. "We have to keep moving. The more kokuchi we stop-"

"Right," Daniel nodded. "So. Elevator?"

"Of course," Akira said sarcastically. "I can't think of anywhere I'd rather be than trapped in a metal box waiting for monsters that can _pass through solid objects_."

"Oh yeah," Daniel muttered dryly, following him onto the stairs. "You and Jack are going to get along like a house on _fire_." A snicker. "Flames, screams, people running for safety…. What was _that?_"

A winter wind, tracing ice down his neck; a down elevator's moment of free fall, before the balance-jarring _thump_ of stopping. "Someone's been possessed," Akira said grimly, leaping upward. "Worse than Dr. Fraiser." He felt the darkness rising, the world itself becoming unstable. And yet… it was different than what had happened with Mayu. Off.

"Worse?" But Daniel gathered his nerve and followed, though he was still yards behind as they raced into the level that felt of _wrongness_.

Which was lucky. For him.

Lightning-shock, a wall that wasn't a wall, a sense of _shredding_ inside-

"Magnetic field," Akira tried to gasp a warning. A _strong_ one. Oddly specific, and _wrong_. "Electromagnets - twist light. Do they-"

Black.

------------

_God looks after drunks, babies, and wandering archaeologists_, Daniel thought, forcing himself to breathe. If Akira hadn't gasped that out, if he hadn't been able to follow that cut-off thought-

_Do they affect_ shadow?

-He'd never have grabbed for his doppleganger. And being in a form that was more flesh and blood than energy seemed like a _really good_ idea about now-

_Akira!_

The young shin was crumpled on the floor, not breathing. And there was an odd green transparence around the edges of him that didn't look right at _all_.

_Damn. _

Stumbling over to the teen, Daniel scrabbled through Akira's coat for the ridiculous black doll. _Hope this works as well as a foot._

Grabbing Akira's hand, he slapped it down on spongy black.

It was slow. He could actually see the change sweep over Akira; hair losing shadow to turn brown, monochrome clothing fading into orange and denim.

But it was over, and Akira was breathing. Barely.

"Good," Daniel rasped. Well, kind of. Flesh and blood or not, it was still a physical effort to breathe; his head hurt like someone had set off a flash-bang in the room. And part of that ache _wasn't_ him.

_Akira's… supporting me._ He hadn't known that, not before this moment. Now, he couldn't see how he'd missed it. _Akira_ was the source of half the energy flooding through him, the shift in perceptions that robbed the shadows of their power to blind. When he'd gone down….

"Electromagnets," Daniel reminded himself. "If that's the problem, where do I find-" He looked down the corridor, and froze.

Reels of wiring, stringing the hall like cobwebs. Red dust scattering through the air, as kokuchi were drawn in and shattered. A wavering in the very walls, that he somehow knew was Very Bad News. And odd, glowing _things_, that reminded him exactly why General Hammond had a standing order that no one was supposed to activate _anything_ with "reactor" in the title without his direct authorization.

_Somebody's been busy._

And it really wasn't a surprise, when he stared down the snake-headed muzzle of a zat. Tech, targeted physics, the kind of emotional darkness and pain that drew parasites like flies to honey… no, it wasn't a surprise. It just hurt.

"Hi, Sam."

------------

_If he dies, O'Neill_, Shirogane thought darkly, _I will bring this fortress down upon your head._

A short-sighted impulse, perhaps. Dr. Jackson had made a good argument for leaving the Stargate unsealed.

_But if your people's foolishness costs me Akira… you will pay. Dearly. _

Though it looked as if that might happen regardless, if they couldn't handle the possessed Tok'ra currently beyond a very thick blast door.

"We're locked out." O'Neill was currently giving the hapless lieutenant left in charge of 'Gateroom security a look that promised later pain. "Everybody inside's either dead or zatted. Martouf's got the dialing program up and running, _and_ he's got an augmented bomb. From our armory. Which he's planning to dump through the 'Gate on somebody's head."

"Sums it up, sir." The lieutenant swallowed dryly.

"Do we have any idea whose?"

"No sir. But before his radio went dead, Major Ridgway said the Tok'ra was muttering something about… getting Major Carter to choose the right side?"

"Is she in there?" O'Neill said bluntly.

"Not as far as we know, sir."

"Thanks for small favors." The colonel raised his voice. "All right, people, listen up! When we get through the door, here's what we're going to do…."

Shirogane listened with half an ear, noting O'Neill made little effort to include them besides "hang back and try not to get shot". Annoying. Pity they didn't have time to enlighten the man, but with the 'Gate opening….

And the young ones _had_ learned well, because he saw the moment Kengo and Aya knew it.

The colonel grimaced at Teal'c, who was studying steel and concrete for the best place to blow it up. "Even with zats, it's going to take time to cut through."

"Time, we do not have. Permit me." Shirogane eyed the door, and reached out to grasp its shadow. "It's been a very long day, and I believe I've had enough of this _foolishness_."

Darkness rose up around him, shadow shredding in his hands. Red sparks shot away, fell like stars into an inky pool. Steel and concrete shuddered, groaned-

Collapsed, into shattered rubble.

Give the colonel credit. He only gaped a moment, before leading the charge.

Shirogane hung back a moment, unwilling to let his short breath disclose how much that had cost him. They'd sealed far too many holes today.

Just one more. He hoped.

_Live_, he willed Akira, reaching through the power that linked them. _I need you. _We_ need you. Do whatever it takes._ Live.

------------

"I'm impressed, Sam. You must have put this together incredibly fast."

Daniel's voice. Worried, but with the same deliberate calm he'd used talking to Janet. When the doctor had been… possessed. Right.

_Don't move yet_, Akira told himself. _Find out where she is, first._

He honestly wasn't sure he _could_ move. Everything hurt. Inside, in a way that made him feel like broken china nestled in bubble-wrap.

_Not good._

"It wasn't that hard." Sam's voice; he could tell by the shivers it traced down his spine. "Daniel left us a recording. I saw how the EM fields clashed. And I saw how they disintegrate when they're destroyed. A few reactors, a little wiring… presto. This level's safe." A petulant _huh_. "I don't know why everybody wants to leave, and take their chances with those _things_."

_Because it's_ not _safe_. Akira swallowed, nauseous. The song of dark and light was warped here. Discordant. It probably wasn't affecting Sam yet, and the kokuchi inside her would be shielded by her shadow - but let this run long enough, and even regular humans could die.

"And once I patch in some more power, I can expand the field to the whole SGC," Sam went on. "And every last one of those things will die. Including _you_."

"Sam. Don't." Daniel swallowed. "It's me."

"No. It's not." There were tears in that voice, mingled with the rage. "I saw the recording. I saw Daniel's EM field collapse. You're not Daniel. Daniel's _dead_." A low hiss. "And now, you're going to-"

"Tell me how it works," Daniel said quickly. "I translated a lot of these devices when they were found, but I've never seen a setup anything like this before. It's incredible."

"You-!"

"Oh, come on," Daniel said gently. "Here I am. A captive audience for all the equations you want to throw at me. And I want to know. Can't you shoot me _after_ you explain?"

"I… well…."

_Good move._ Akira opened his eyes, gathering his strength. Daniel was pale and shaky, but determined, coaxing Sam to one of the reactors near the edge of the effect. Which put him _behind_ both of them. Out of Sam's view, and line of fire.

_Can't transform as long as this field's up. We have to find another way to get the parasite out of her. _

And him without so much as a packet of salt to drive the darkness out of her. If he lived through this, he was never going anywhere without salt again.

_Drive it out of her._ Drain _it out of her._

Damn. There _was_ a way.

_I can't. That would be shin form, and I_ can't-

_Live._

Shirogane's will, reaching out to wrap him in chill calculation. Shirogane's friendship, and worry, and a far-off sense of exhaustion.

If _Shirogane_ was reaching his limits, everyone was in danger.

_Breathe_, Akira told himself, rising soundlessly to his feet. Leaning against the wall even so, and praying Daniel kept her distracted. A kitten could fight him off right now, much less a possessed human. _Reach for the memories. Don't hesitate. Don't fear. _

_Show me what I need to know._

Shard after glimmering shard, and he _knew_ he didn't need to be in shin form. All he needed was darkness, and he could summon that as he was.

_This is going to hurt. _

In more ways than one. Shifts in a shin form could be covered by a human appearance. But he was already in human form, he had to make the changes _here_-

_I promised. I promised Shirogane I'd be there._

_And I promised myself. _

Grimly, Akira pulled in the first threads of darkness.

It was like drinking acid. But he wouldn't scream. Not when air finally passed the limits of Sam's device to diffuse shadow's spreading effects, and turned red-lit and dangerous. Not when the floor softened, from solid concrete to shadowy gel, surging with waves, and Daniel stuttered, sinking into the sea; reaching out to Sam, even as she raised her weapon toward him.

_Don't think! We have to stop her_ now, _or the darkness will engulf the whole level - and if we can't shift, we'll be swallowed up too-_

Grabbing her from behind, Akira sank in black waves. Knocked his skull against hers, saw stars, felt lips touch the skin of her neck-

And _bit_.

It was like being two different people. Half himself, holding on in the face of terror because his friends needed him. Because Shirogane wasn't a monster, and Kou wasn't, and he trusted them. The other half was a tangle of memories and anger and _I will not die here_-

…_Mmm._

Not so much the coppery drops seeping free, though that… wasn't unpleasant. But the warm flood of darkness into him, seeping into all the aches left by her device… yes. The pressure and ache and change as darkness followed memory's path to shift teeth from merely sharp to _other_. The vibrant flickers of what it would be like, now, to kiss another shin; tongue brushing sharpness, licking up to draw fangs down….

And the fact he could imagine that so vividly was _not_ all due to the memories, which was definitely Shirogane's fault. So he'd _better_ be alive, because Akira was going to kill him.

On the edge of his vision, Sam's shadow twitched.

_Not enough darkness to anchor it anymore. It's coming loose-_

The parasite was losing. But the explosion of pain across his ribs told him Sam wasn't finished yet.

------------

_Switch, switch_, Daniel thought frantically, trying not to sink into the dark waves. _C'mon, one of these has got to be…._

He'd thrown just about everything that looked like a circuit interrupt, and a few things that didn't. Just because Sam had explained, didn't mean she'd told him the truth. All the while trying not to listen to the struggle going on behind him, which was hard, because this was _Sam_-

Sam, who was possessed. Whose invention was killing them.

_And she's got to be as strong as Belson right now. She'll_ kill _Akira, if I can't-_

Another cable yanked out of its socket, and the floor went solid.

_Down!_

Heeding that impulse, Daniel dropped flat.

Sam hit the wall beside him. Hard.

_Here it comes…. _

Warned, Daniel released his doppleganger, snapping out his whip as centipede-like black burst from Sam's back. Snared the screeching parasite, and _yanked-_

Sparks, and the world faded back to normal hues.

He crouched beside Sam, turning her with a wince at her mangled neck. Bloody, but mostly surface tearing, looked like. Away from the major veins, thank god.

_You hit your enemy with anything you can when the chips are down, I know that, but still…._

Pain. _Not_ his.

One last pat to Sam's cheek, and Daniel turned to Akira. And fought not to panic. "Lie down, I'll get Janet-"

"Looks worse than it is," the young shin managed. Coughed, wiped azure from his lips, and winced. "Damn. She got a rib."

"More like a couple of them," Daniel muttered, putting an arm around thin shoulders so Akira could lean on him. Sure, Sam was out - but she was alive. And probably not that hurt, despite the blood. Akira… how could he get Janet up here?

"Had worse. I'll heal." But for all his matter-of-fact tone, Akira sagged against him. "I'm sorry. I had to."

"You're sorry?" Daniel said in disbelief.

"When a parasite merges with its host that much… it distorts the whole boundary. This level would have been swallowed up. And if that happened - there's so many tears in this place, even Shirogane couldn't have stopped it. The whole SGC, the whole _mountain_…. I had to stop her." Akira's voice was faint, and young. "I didn't want to do it. It was the only way not to kill her…."

Daniel blinked, and reexamined what he thought he'd seen. "You didn't just bite her to distract her."

The dark head shook. "Some shin can - drain darkness from a person. I'm sorry…."

Another look at Sam, and Daniel swallowed hard. "_I_ don't have teeth like that."

Akira winced. Tried to pull away-

"Whoa. Whoa! Don't move. Ribs." Carefully, Daniel lifted his free hand to stroke shadowed hair. "Sam told me a long time ago, she'd rather die than let something take her over again. She'd rather _die_, Akira. And she's not dead." He shrugged. "She meant Goa'uld, but I think this counts."

"We're not monsters," Akira whispered.

"Monsters wouldn't be trying to save people," Daniel said firmly. _You fight monsters. You've helped kill a man. Why is_ this _upsetting you?_ "So… can I see?"

"What?" Akira glanced up, alarmed. "No!"

…_Houston, we just hit a taboo. _

Interesting. _Very_ interesting. Akira wasn't just upset, he was _blushing_. Put that together with _I'm sorry_-

_Oh. My._ Daniel cleared his throat. "Um. Akira? I'm an anthropologist, not just an archaeologist. I've dealt with… a lot of odd customs. So - and if I'm wrong about this, you can tell me to go to hell - I'm going to take a wild guess, and say some shin… like to bite?"

Oh yeah. That was one bright-red embarrassed teenager. No question.

"Okay," Daniel nodded. And sobered. _No wonder he's upset._ "Trust me, Sam would rather be alive. All right?" He took a better hold on Akira's shoulders. "Let's get down to Janet."

"I can't," Akira said grimly. Took a shallow breath, and fixed him with a steady gaze. "Shirogane needs us."

------------

_Stop!_ Lantash screamed at his maddened host, desperately trying to stop Martouf's finger from pressing the button to start the bomb-laden MALP up the Stargate's ramp. _Yu has been neutral toward the Tau'ri; destroy his capital world, and the System Lords_ will _find a way to destroy Earth. Our source of emergency hosts will be gone, and our goals will be set back centuries-_

:_I don't care._:

Which shouldn't have mattered. Blended partners or not, Lantash could control his host's body in an emergency. Which this most certainly was-

But he'd tried. And failed. Something blocked every effort he made to take over; something dark and alien, twisting all Martouf's thoughts into focused, terrible rage. Rage that meant to destroy them all, to get Martouf what he wanted. A human, _emotional_ desire, as alien to the High Council's careful plans as a nautilus on a mountain top.

Alien, and stupid, and _primitive_. Everything Tok'ra should not be. The shame was unbearable. Martouf was not only about to destroy their plans, he would destroy Lantash's right to be treated as a civilized creature. For any host so insane as to threaten Egeria's purpose _must_ be sacrificed; poisoned, and left to die, as the Tok'ra left it behind. And if there were no other hosts to take - better death than to go against their Queen.

And he couldn't even do that. Whatever was inside Martouf - it was as if the venom was harmless as spring rain.

He was trapped, trapped in mad flesh and bone, and he couldn't even die….

The door crumbled, and Lantash writhed at the pathetic hope of being rescued by the Tau'ri. Fragile, futile hope.

The shadows were waiting for them.

------------

_First things first_, Jack thought grimly, zatting the MALP's treads three times before he worried about the shadowed hordes descending on them. Teal'c was covering him, and that was as safe as anyone was going to get in this world.

But man, there were a lot of kokuchi….

Kou laughed behind him, grim and eager. Jack caught a hint of green fire around the punk-

_What the?_

White outfit, black straps flinging out to snare kokuchi like tentacles, and a full set of metal claws to shred them. Still grinning, Kou dove into the fray.

_Outfit change, freaky_, Jack decided. _Yellow cat-eyes instead of regular gray -_ very _freaky._

The two kids weren't quite as weird, though he had to look twice at the paired swords Aya had pulled out of _nowhere_, never mind the samurai-style armor. And the fact that Kengo was punching kokuchi with odd gauntlets - and it was _working_ - made his common sense throw up its hands and go gibber in a corner.

Though frankly, he was way too mad to gibber. The kids were fighting as a team. A _practiced_ one. Which meant a pair of _high school_ kids had been dealing with _target-rich environments_ long enough for it to be old hat.

When this was over, he was going to have a talk with these people. Even the blind guy.

…Who'd just casually tossed a kokuchi over his shoulder in a move that shattered it like glass.

Okay. So, talk with Shuichi _out_ of grabbing range.

Jack gave Teal'c a nod, and they broke for where the MALP was still inching up the ramp. Thing was usually controlled by radio, but there was a manual cutoff- _Gotcha._

Pain slammed through his nervous system, and he was going to have _words_ with whoever let Martouf grab a zat….

------------

If anyone had inquired, Teal'c would have stated it was impossible for a human to dodge a zat blast.

That both Kou and Shirogane proved capable of doing so in no way altered that opinion. He had seen a great many varieties of human, on this planet and across the galaxy. None had vertical pupils. Much less eyes that appeared at first ordinary, then, under combat stress, changed to become… inhuman.

Still. Their species was of little concern, compared to their aid in battle. Which was, currently, considerable, given that the Tok'ra Martouf had every intention of reclaiming the explosive device and killing O'Neill. His exact words were difficult to discern through the shrieks of the kokuchi, but apparently Martouf seemed convinced O'Neill was a rival for Major Carter's attentions. Which was foolish, given Tau'ri honor and service regulations.

But then, Teal'c reflected, firing into the oncoming swarm, Tok'ra did not seem to believe any other creatures had honor. "Shirogane! Why are the kokuchi shielding Martouf?" For they were, meaning O'Neill's plan for SGC personnel to neutralize Martouf and shut down the 'Gate was encountering… difficulties.

"Shuichi!" Shirogane called out, coolly yanking a shadow away from a wall to shield against another zat blast.

Blue light shattered shadow, and the shin dodged with wide-eyed haste.

Reluctantly, the two teenagers broke from their position defending SGC soldiers, guiding Shuichi at a run over to them.

"They're protecting Martouf because he's holding the door open," Shuichi said plainly, as his companions took up battle again to give them time to speak. "So long as he's possessed, we may not be able to seal the tear. Too much darkness is leaking through. We'd need at least one more to help, and Akira's… in grave danger. And if we can't seal the tear…." A wave, at the endless hordes.

"Remove the possession," Teal'c stated.

"Well," Shuichi said dryly, "the fastest way is to kill him."

A viable option, given the implied threat to the SGC. Still. Those members of security left in this room had been zatted and bound, not killed. "He is an ally. It would cause difficulties." Teal'c studied Shuichi. "What other ways exist?"

"Hmm. Doubt we'll be able to remind him of happy memories in this. Still, there's always-" Shuichi stopped, and asked Kengo a question.

"Hai!"

Blind or not, Shuichi caught the small wooden box easily as reaching out his hand. "How's your throwing arm?"

------------

_I don't want to be here_. But Aya gritted her teeth and fought on, even if Kuresame was tugging at her; _Akira is in danger, Akira needs help_. The armlet was probably right - but if Shirogane believed they had to be here, she trusted him. She had to. Just as she had to trust Akira would keep himself alive until they _could_ get to him.

_He's shin. He may be out of practice, but he has a fighting chance. _

Though Aya wasn't sure she bought all of Master's story about Akira having been temporarily stuck as a human due to his injuries. Maybe in part, sure - but she'd seen Akira's relief after it was all over. When the attacks had ended, and Homurabi's shin were gone, and his life was normal again. Like he'd wanted it to be.

He'd probably even _believed_ that.

_I should have dragged him to Father to straighten him out. _

And she might have, if she'd thought the dojo would survive Akira's reaction. Instead, she'd let him be. She'd hated watching Akira slip away from them, but she'd bitten her lip and _waited_, wondering how long it'd take Akira to see in the mirror what any swordsman could see in his eyes.

_Not a loser punk anymore. A fighter. A warrior. _

_We've seen too much. Done too much. All of us. Normal… just doesn't fit anymore. _

But she and Kengo had chosen to walk into Shirogane's war. Akira never had. So she'd let him alone. And waited. And watched him pine for their company, for _combat_, getting twitchier and twitchier.

Knowing Shirogane's twisty mind as much as she did, Aya had to wonder if the shadow king had been waiting, too.

_Hope it worked._ Aya let a scythe-like claw glance off one sword, brought the other around through her opponent's core. _I'm tired of waiting!_

Speaking of waiting, when were these soldiers going to shape up and fight like they meant it? They were so slow….

Glittering white arced over the possessed man, tossed by Teal'c's unerring hand. Dark energy steamed off him; he writhed, temporarily blind-

Kou mummified him in black strips, and they both went down.

"Gah," came from the gray-haired man twitching beside Master.

_"Stay down, Colonel. They have him."_

At least, that's what she thought Master said. English sounded a lot different in the middle of a fight. Either that, or what the colonel was saying just didn't make sense; something about snakes, hand to hand?

Something snapped, and Kou went sailing through the air with the most stunned look she'd ever seen on the rei's face.

…_We're in trouble._

------------

Possessed people, Kengo thought, gaping, did _not_ throw Kou like a feather pillow. It just didn't happen.

Only it did, it had, and he really, really wasn't surprised to hear Shirogane's cane crackle into a sword. The floor was beginning to soften in that gut-wrenching way that meant darkness was reaching critical mass, and there was really only one thing Shirogane could do.

Swallowing hard, Kengo concentrated on his own fight. He didn't want to watch.

Which meant he never saw it coming, when the explosion blasted them all down.

------------

_Note_, Shirogane thought dizzily, trying to lever himself off the floor, _accidentally cutting zat'ni'katels in half… not a good idea._

Gods, he must be tired. Possessed people were fast, true, but that blow should have cut the man in half. Not his weapon.

The room had an annoying tendency to spin, but he could see the Tok'ra half-crouched on the floor. Even with the parasite cushioning his body, he'd been shaken-

A chorus of shrieks split the air, and Shirogane's blood ran cold. Kokuchi weren't like shin. They didn't have a fixed, _vulnerable_ form. They were flexible as shadow, as air. Strike anywhere but their core, and it was only a momentary inconvenience.

And even without minds, they knew when their greatest foe was vulnerable.

Howling, they descended-

_Inversion._

------------

Akira swallowed, looking at the tear from the shadows; a vertical gash taller than a man, aching red and black in the boundary. The substance of the world itself seemed to be boiling, swarming with kokuchi leaping through the rift.

"Doesn't look good," Daniel muttered beside him.

_No, really?_

"So, Jack usually goes into situations like this with a plan-"

Kokuchi swarming with _purpose_. Jackals heading for a wounded lion of a shin.

_Shirogane._

Hunting knives reshaped into more lethal blades, Akira jumped back into the world of light, slashing through the nearest enemy. "Split up, so we can cover more ground?" he shot at Shirogane. "You need to see more horror movies!"

"_You_ never watch horror movies," Shirogane said defensively.

Not even a good evasion. Shirogane must be in even worse shape than he was.

And there was no more time to worry. Only to move and kill and ignore the pain-

Daniel's whip cracked out, and the rhythm of battle _shifted_.

_There's the possession. _

Who was definitely going to be feeling this tomorrow, given he'd been tied down and landed on by Daniel, Kou, Shirogane, and a gray-haired officer who'd just delivered one hell of an uppercut.

The possessed man sagged, and Shirogane ripped the parasite free, evidently not caring what damage was done to the host. Snapped the multi-legged body like a whip, letting momentum fling it free before the venomous fangs could bite.

Kengo's double punch shattered it.

_Kengo. Aya._ If they weren't in the midst of a swarm, he might have run to them. From their quick, eager glances, they definitely wanted to be in grabbing range.

_It's not over yet._ Akira kept would-be attackers off Shirogane's back as the Tok'ra finally succumbed to unconsciousness. "Can we seal it?"

"I must." Shirogane's voice was iron.

"You?" Akira snorted. "That big? After today?"

"Akira-kun, you're injured-"

"So?"

"Share the burden," Shuichi said swiftly. "I will stand for light, and balance your strength."

Shirogane didn't argue. Which was chilling.

_Later. Get it sealed. Get the kokuchi out of here. Then you can yell at him for being an idiot._ "Aya! Kou! Kengo!"

He didn't need to say anything more. They fought their way into place, Kou guarding Akira and Shirogane with a truly vicious grin.

_"Our hands are the healers of zero…"_

Wind howled through the massive room, and it was over.

"So," the graying officer drawled into the sudden silence. "Who're you supposed to be, Colorado Jackson?"

"Shut up, Jack." Red-faced, Daniel stomped on his doppleganger. And swayed. "Ugh. And I thought the first trip through the 'Gate was bad…."

_The Stargate._ Leaning against Shirogane, Akira stared up at the massive, gray-crystal ring, and knew _exactly_ what Shuichi had meant.

_The 'Gate to other worlds, and evils beyond imagination. I'm going to have nightmares tonight…._

He didn't fall. He had a grip of steel on Shirogane, who was just as wrapped around him, and neither of them were going to fall.

But the floor came up, and the lights went out, and he could only hope Shuichi had something left….

------------

_Hold on. Just hold on one more moment, my friends. _

A last tug on his strength - almost the last of his strength - and Shuichi sank back on his haunches beside the wounded shin. "They'll live." Thank the gods. To lose one king of the shin was bad. To lose the direct king, and the king-to-be - no. Anything but that.

"What happened?" Kengo demanded, crowding in now that his friend was breathing quietly again. "He looks awful!"

"Internal injuries," Shuichi said grimly. Mere broken ribs wouldn't have injured a shin so deeply. "Something that disrupted the very energies of shadow."

"Sam," Daniel said in weary English. "She was possessed. Came up with something that broke kokuchi into little pieces. Almost killed us."

"She's okay?" O'Neill asked.

"It was close."

"Indeed," Shuichi nodded. "Anything that destroys shadows, destroys those of light they support as well."

"Just takes a little longer," Kou agreed darkly, checking Akira and Shirogane in a rustle of clothing. Light and shadow shifted in Shuichi's senses-

_Ah_, Shuichi thought, feeling both shin shift back into ordinary visibility. _So we're all going to appear human? Probably wise._

"All right," O'Neill said crisply. "Big hole in the air slammed shut. Shadow thingies gone. Is it over?"

"It should be," Shuichi stated. "If we can avoid triggering whatever caused the tears in the first place."

"Oh yeah," Daniel sighed. "Jack? We're shutting the Tok'ra project down. Now."

"I'll talk to the general," O'Neill stated. "Meanwhile… Teal'c? I think our guests have a date with the doc."


	4. Chapter 4

"We're leaving."

Hammond raised an eyebrow, careful to keep his face neutral. Despite the casualty lists piling up on his desk, there was a certain grim humor to be found in watching the calm, logical, galactically _civilized_ Tok'ra scared out of their blended minds. "May I remind you we're still investigating this incident? Your input would be-"

"We are _leaving_." Lantash, wide-eyed and shaken. "The High Council must know there exists something… capable of interfering with a blending. We must return to report."

"We would appreciate your assistance," Hammond said plainly. "But in the interests of the Earth-Tok'ra alliance - Godspeed, gentlemen." He paused. "However. Given that we have determined this so-called invisibility prototype was the source of this disaster, I'm afraid that will be staying. Here."

They argued, but not for long. Aldwin kept jumping at shadows, and Lantash….

Lantash hadn't let Martouf speak once. Curious.

The SGC's unwelcome allies finally departed, and Hammond could at last give the status reports the attention they deserved. The facts were grim. Facility damage, casualties, fatalities….

It could have been worse. Much worse.

And it would have been, if not for the brave young people currently under Janet's care. People who claimed to be natives of Earth, yet could accomplish things no human was capable of. Including waltzing through Cheyenne Mountain security as if it didn't exist.

_Just what are these shin?_

------------

"They're human."

Jack eyed the still-frazzled doc as she laid her results on the general's desk. Apparently last night's overall lack of alarms had barely taken the edge off the damage yesterday had done. To everyone.

Surreptitiously, he eyed the rest of his team, currently crowding the general's office. Teal'c looked intrigued, Danny relieved, and Sam-

Sam had her face buried in a mug of extra-strength coffee, deliberately not fingering the bandage on her neck.

"You're sure?" Hammond frowned. "May I remind you we all saw _blue_, Doctor?"

"Apparently, that's what hemoglobin _does_, working under the physical laws of the universe applicable to shin and kokuchi," Janet said plainly. "I've had plenty of chances to check. Did you know the dopplegangers are only effective to about eighteen feet? Past that - well, any lab tech who can't see kokuchi thinks I'm holding a vial of air. Really weirds people out when I move it in and out of that radius." She shrugged. "They have a few added blood proteins, an enlarged reticular formation - Akira can probably see Reetou - and who knows what else we might find. But genetically, they _are_ human. Even Shirogane."

"Shirogane doesn't seem to think he's human," Jack pointed out.

"That's probably more cultural than anything else," Daniel put in. "Like Tau'ri and the Tollans. If you could do what we've seen shin do, and you were responsible for keeping a balance the rest of the world doesn't even know exists… Shirogane just doesn't have much in common with most people." Daniel stared at the surface of his coffee. "He must be very lonely."

_Lonely enough to_ make _you something else_, Jack almost snarled. _I do not like him. Not one little bit._

"I appreciate your empathy for the man, Dr. Jackson, but the idea is to prevent another such invasion," Hammond said bluntly.

"It's related, General." Daniel looked up. "Because given all the magnetic fields we've got in the SGC, between the MRIs to check for Goa'uld and all our other equipment, if we want to keep kokuchi _out_ of the base, we need to be sure there's enough shin to maintain the boundary. All over the planet." Daniel paused, and let out a deliberate breath. "Which might be tough. Because right now, General, I think most of the surviving shin are down in our infirmary."

That got Sam to look up. "They're it?" she said in disbelief. "That's _all_ there are? Shirogane, Akira, Shuichi, and Kou?"

"And me, and a pink-haired menace called Lulu," Daniel said plainly. "I think so, yes. Only, less than that. Shuichi's an adept, not a shin. And not Kou."

"Danny, we all saw him fight," Jack pointed out.

"With a lot of the same abilities, yes," Daniel acknowledged. "But when Akira sensed them show up, he said it _wasn't_ a shin. And then he - um - mentioned Kou specifically."

Mentioned, as in lambasted curses on, sounded like. Huh.

"Everything in the world of light is supposed to have a counterpart in shadow," Daniel went on. "Shirogane said shin had _less direct_ counterparts than humans, and _Akira_ said Homurabi killed shin _and their allies_, trying to destabilize the worlds." He spread a hand. "I think Kou is one of those allies."

"Homurabi being this… second king of the shin," Hammond stated, consulting Daniel's report.

Which was proof right there Danny needed a keeper. Who in their right minds would have stayed up after yesterday to write a report?

"The one reading the world domination handbook, yes," Daniel nodded. "From what Akira _isn't_ telling me, I think there _might_ be more shin out there. Hiding. The way Shirogane did."

"Until he could position himself to take the guy out," Jack said darkly. "Did I mention I don't like the idea of using teenage kids to do that?"

"People Akira's age fight on Abydos, Jack. And plenty of places here on Earth, not so long ago," Daniel pointed out. "And once Akira was a shin, Shirogane didn't have a _choice_ to leave him out of it. Homurabi would have hunted him down, just for being a shin not under his control. That's one reason I think they _are_ almost all the shin. There's nobody left to protect the noncombatants. Not from Homurabi; not even from kokuchi." The archaeologist shook his head. "Not that Shirogane would have left Akira out of it, anyway. He's got way too much to learn, and no time to do it."

Jack added that, and how he'd seen those two interacting, and shot Danny an incredulous look. "You've got to be kidding. That little punk of a kid?"

"That _punk_," Daniel said with just a slight edge in his voice, "knows more than I do about string theory. Picks up what Shirogane does with the shadows almost as fast as he does it. _Cares_ about his people. Even cares about a shin who tried to _kill_ him - Lulu was one of Homurabi's, and she really doesn't like humans. Maybe he's a little rough around the edges-"

"A little?" Jack said skeptically.

"Anyway, when it comes down to it, it doesn't matter what we think. _Shirogane_ thinks he's right for the job. Or he'd be holding the energy-bond on me, instead of Akira."

And exactly how that made sense, Jack never got to ask. The general's phone rang, Hammond answered - and paused, for a very long moment. "That would be the front gate." Hammond eyed his 2IC. "Dr. Catherine Langford is here to see you."

_Say what?_

------------

"We should get out of here," Akira muttered, gingerly prying himself out of the infirmary bed with Shirogane's wounded help. Shuichi had had to save most of his strength for sealing, not healing. And Kou wasn't any good at either. "We should get out, _now_."

"Why?" Kengo hovered nearby, obviously torn between wanting to hold Akira up and keeping an eye out for security and stray nurses. "These are the good guys!"

"But they're a secret. And now we know it." Aya swallowed, worried. "No one else knows where we are. We don't even have passports."

"They're right, Ken," Kou said; serious for once. "This is no place for people like us to stick around. Right, Master?"

"And if we leave, and they're not convinced to abandon this device which breaches the boundary?" Shuichi stated. "We'll only get one chance to convince them."

"Then the four of you should go," Akira argued. "Shirogane and I can leave anytime. You-"

"We want to stay with _you_, Akira," Kengo said stubbornly. "We've got your back. Remember?"

Akira clapped a hand to his forehead, fighting an odd desire to smile. No point in encouraging Kengo. His friend's enthusiasm could power half of Tokyo. "Shirogane…."

"They should stay." The silver-haired shin's voice was level and cold, the way it only got when things were deadly serious. "We may need their power, if the SGC proves… unreasonable. To eliminate any trace that we were _ever_ here."

"You can't just change what people remember!" Aya protested.

_You can_, Akira thought, chilled by the gravity of blue eyes, pupils narrowed to deadly cat-slits. _If there's no one_ left _to remember._ "Shirogane…."

"If we are destroyed, the balance is lost," the king of the shin said bluntly. "I cannot allow that."

_And they have my name. They can find me - and that would let them find_ everyone. _Unless we all want to live the rest of our lives in the shadows… and Aya_ can't _do that…._ Akira swallowed, and nodded. "Whatever it takes."

"You don't have to," Shirogane began.

"Ch'! I'm your _partner_." Akira glared at him. "Kengo and Aya are _my_ people."

Shirogane inclined his head. "So they are."

"Hey! What about me?" Kou grinned.

"You, can look after yourself," Akira grumbled. "If the Yakuza can't shut you down, I know you can dodge the American government…."

Something shimmered on the edge of his senses. Something he'd never felt before, yet oddly familiar. "Master," Shirogane breathed; eyes bright, normal again. "Can it be?"

"Yes." Even the rei king's calm voice held excitement. "I believe it is."

"What?" Kengo asked, confused. "Akira?"

"Company," Akira warned, placing himself in front of Shirogane to meet Dr. Fraiser's glare head-on.

"You shouldn't be out of bed," the doctor said bluntly. Glared at Shirogane anyway. "Neither of you."

"Ah. Well, dear lady," Shirogane started.

"I am not _your_ dear anything, Mr. Shirogane. And as for you, Akira-"

"I've had worse," Akira interrupted.

"Oh, have you." A familiar voice, though the angry worry in it was new. "And why haven't I heard of this before, Akira?"

Akira stared, wide-eyed, as the graceful elderly lady followed Dr. Fraiser in. "Oba-san?" Swallowed hard, and switched back to English. "Aunt Catherine?"

"Oh dear," Shirogane murmured.

Shuichi stifled a chuckle. "You're in trouble, old friend."

"Indeed," Catherine Langford said dryly. "Someone had better have a _very_ good explanation…." Her voice trailed off, and she paled. "I know you."

"Ah, likely not," Shirogane protested.

"Germany, 1932. You were arguing with my grandfather. Telling him to get out, before the _humans_ caught his family up in another war." She gazed at Shirogane with mingled curiosity and horror. "What on _earth_ is a _rei?_"

------------

"A rei," Shuichi Wagatsuma said gravely, seated beside Shirogane under Catherine's disapproving eye, "is a shin's counterpart."

_You split up so there's at least one shin with each group, meaning everybody's got a way out_, Jack calculated, lounging back in a conference room chair. _Smart. Just what I'd do, if I didn't trust me. Which you don't, given how you feel about Tok'ra._

Fair was fair; he didn't trust _them_, either. Which was exactly why he had Daniel up here, where he could keep an eye on the errant archaeologist - and Sam and Teal'c down in the infirmary.

Though to be honest, given how good Goa'uld were at taking over places… maybe he couldn't blame Shirogane. Too much.

_Wonder if Danny's noticed the tactics?_ "So what's that mean, exactly?" Jack asked. "Knock off a rei, kill a shin at the same time?"

"Colonel!" Catherine's fingers clenched on the edge of the table.

"Hey, somebody had to ask," Jack shrugged. "Though I'm guessing not, given what Homurabi tried to pull."

"You are correct," Shirogane inclined his head. "The connection is not nearly so direct. It's simply that for the worlds to be in balance, the number of rei and shin should be roughly equal."

"And what has that to do with my grandfather?" Catherine asked tartly. "Or what you've done with Akira? His shadow-" She shook her head, unwilling to say more.

"Looks odd?" Shirogane offered. "As does mine?"

"And Daniel's," she whispered. "What have you done?"

"You can see that?" Daniel blurted out. "How?"

Frankly, Jack would have been more inclined to ask _what_. Given he didn't see anything besides regular shadows.

"For the same reason Wilhelm Langford's records were never as legal as the authorities thought," Shirogane stated. "He was rei, who fled the war and hid himself as a human. I tried to persuade him to return. To at least warn his children what they were, and what deadly legacy he'd left them."

Catherine straightened. "Tell me."

"And no evasions," Shuichi put in before Shirogane could speak. "Akira will hound you until doomsday to get a straight answer… and while I know you think that's fun, it's a bit hard on the rest of us."

Shirogane looked woefully distraught. Sighed, and shrugged. "On this side, kokuchi attack humans. But they tend to attack those with an inshi, first. Which means, unless they're guarded, descendents of rei or shin tend to die in… accidents."

_Accidents_. Jack glanced at Daniel, and knew by his pallor just what conclusion he'd jumped to. You couldn't be made a shin without an inshi, and if to have an inshi someone in your family tree had to _be_ a shin… hoo, boy.

"Jason?" Catherine breathed. "Does Akira know?"

"He doesn't talk about his father," Shirogane shook his head. "If the death was as you imply - well. It may have been an accident, in truth. Or…." He glanced aside. "Homurabi determined two decades ago that I was likely to be in Japan. He went to a great deal of effort to find any in that land with an inshi. I still don't believe that first tear at Akira's school was an accident. Not with Nanaya and Lulu showing up so soon afterward."

Catherine's gaze never wavered. "So some of these… kokuchi… attacked Akira."

"And Kengo, and Aya," Shirogane nodded. "You'd have been proud, Miss Catherine. Akira managed to hold them off with a shinai. For a little while. Long enough for me to get there. Unfortunately-"

"Shirogane's not the most reassuring of people, even when he isn't spitting kokuchi on that stick of his," Shuichi put in. "I might have panicked as well, I think."

"Cane," Shirogane stated.

"Ah, yes. The _elegant_ stick."

"Master!"

"I think I'm missing something," Daniel put in, still pale. "If Akira's Catherine's cousin, wouldn't that make him a rei?"

"Under ordinary circumstances," Shuichi agreed. "Yes. He should have been. But the surviving king of the rei has hidden himself very well. And once Akira fell through the tear, there wasn't time to track him down. Shirogane took a chance. It worked… though Akira was quite fragile for some time."

Catherine's hand crept near her heart. "He was ill? He didn't tell me."

"He didn't know," Shirogane admitted. "He only knew that other shin had him badly outmatched. The odds were so much against us already…." He smiled. "He's doing well now."

"Well?" Catherine said bitterly. "Akane only called me because she didn't wish Colonel O'Neill to contact Midori. It wouldn't be good for the _company_, that sort of attention. She didn't even believe Akira was here!"

Shirogane and Shuichi shared a glance. The blind man grimaced, and Shirogane sighed.

"Not news to you," Jack stated.

"No," Shuichi said plainly. "No, I'm afraid not."

"Oh god." Catherine's eyes closed. "Tell me she's not abandoning him again."

"Again?" Hammond said pointedly, beating Jack to it.

Catherine winced. "Jason died when Akira was eight. I found out some weeks later, when a letter arrived in the mail. From Akira." She stopped, reluctant to talk. "When I arrived… Akane's not uncaring, she's simply not… maternal. Jason had always been the parent in the house, and…." Fingers clenched. "She _promised_ me she wouldn't do that again!"

"I have no idea if she is," Shirogane said levelly. "The bills are paid. She visits twice a month to see if he's intact… well, usually twice a month." A rueful smile. "And terrifying the school into ignoring Akira's absences so he'd stop rebelling by _being_ absent didn't work, but that's not her fault. Chihara-sensei actually cares if Akira's there or not. Even if he does turn in the work on time."

Catherine muttered something very uncomplimentary in German.

"So, what? You're the only responsible person in the kid's life?" Jack said skeptically.

"Of course not." That smile of dark mischief was back. "Akira can't _stand_ responsible people. Responsible people, he's told, will take care of him, and so he should do what they say. Only they never do. They die on him. They leave him. Or - forgive me, Miss Catherine - they're too far away to make a difference." A shrug, that only looked casual. "I pester him. I drag him into danger. I tell him he can choose to try to push his friends out of the battle, but that won't keep them safe. So he has to find another way. He has to make sure they can take care of _themselves_ in combat, as much as they can. He has to judge their strengths, and weaknesses, and how best to use both with his own. I am certainly not _responsible_."

"Isn't that the truth," Shuichi sighed. Laid his hands atop one another on the table, and regarded Hammond with closed eyes. "What do you intend to do about the Tok'ra research?"

The general grimaced. "I've confiscated the original equipment, and I can ban any more experiments here. But in all honesty, Mr. Wagatsuma, there's nothing I can do about their work off the planet."

"Maybe there is," Daniel said thoughtfully. "I think I know what they were trying to do."

"What, cracking physics books in your spare time?" Jack put in.

"Not the equations, Jack. The goal. I think." Daniel licked his lips. "Remember that night after we dealt with Heru'ur, and you were moving tokens on a world map trying to plan out how the original rebellion against Ra went down?"

"Exercise in frustration, yeah," Jack recalled grumpily. "Still don't know how we pulled it off. Egypt-era weapons against Jaffa and death gliders… even if you accepted one hell of a casualty rate, without a C3 structure…." He stopped. And eyed Shirogane all over again.

"C3?" Catherine frowned.

"Command, control, communications, Dr. Langford," Hammond informed her. "With it, you can win against overwhelming odds. Without it, even Goa'uld technology wouldn't be enough." And he was eyeing their guests with just as interested a look. "Japan, Dr, Jackson?"

"Akira went from here to there in maybe two minutes, if the clocks were right," Daniel said simply. "How's that change the scenario, Jack?"

"From no way in hell, to just maybe," Jack said thoughtfully. "Well?"

The shin inclined his head. "So our history records. There have never been many of us, but we were able to carry messages, and adepts, where they were needed most. Still. How would knowing this dissuade the Tok'ra from their efforts?"

"Because you couldn't help Abydos," Daniel said simply. "And I think I know why."

"Danny," Jack warned.

"I'm not offended, Colonel. The past cannot be changed. We could not reach Abydos to help, any more than you could without the Stargate," Shirogane said plainly. "Time and space bend for us in the shadows, but not that much. You can't shadow-walk through the airless gulf of stars. Everyone who's tried, has perished. Horribly."

"And that," Daniel said bluntly, "is what the Tok'ra are _really_ trying to do. Find a way to get their spies into and out of ships and bases the System Lords can't stop. Only it won't work." He frowned, thoughtful "I bet that's why Ra tried to bomb Earth instead of take it over again. He might not have known what shin were, but he knew _where_ you were. And where you couldn't get to, without the 'Gate."

"Well enough for you gentlemen and your plans for the galaxy," Catherine said angrily. "What about Akira?"

"Dr. Langford, this is a classified base," Hammond started.

"You can't keep him here!"

"Oh, quite literally," Shirogane murmured. _"En merer-er ari-ef, mest'et'-ef an ari-nef."_

Catherine started at that. Almost hid her glance at Daniel. Who was looking _suspiciously_ bland.

Apparently reassured, she fixed her gaze on Shirogane. _"An khena-ten ba-a, an saa-ten khabit-a, un aat en ba-a, en khabit-a."_

"So it is," Shirogane nodded. "And so it will be." And added something else Jack couldn't quite catch.

"English?" Jack put in.

"She's just checking his bona fides." And Daniel _still_ looked butter-wouldn't-melt innocent. Right.

Given how the general cleared his throat, Hammond was just as doubtful. "Dr. Langford?"

"General." Catherine looked as serious as he'd ever seen her; serious as the day he'd handed her back a medallion of Ra, and told her he _couldn't_ tell her. "I would like to speak to these gentlemen. Alone."

------------

"So, Daniel says you believe shadows aren't just the absence of light, but an actual physical manifestation of another dimension," Major Carter said skeptically. "Do you know how many laws of physics that would invalidate, if it were true? How do you think something like that even works?"

Kou grinned at her. "Magic, lovely lady! Magic. As is the way you're wearing that uniform…"

Sitting on the infirmary bed with Kengo and Aya, Akira groaned, trying not to listen any more.

"What are they saying?" Aya asked in Japanese.

"It's Kou," Akira said dryly. "What do you think he's saying?"

"So when's she going to hit him?" Kengo smirked.

"Who knows."

"I thought I was doing well in English," Aya complained. "I hardly understand anything!"

"It's not like the books in school," Akira shrugged. "Try reading some American books. The rhythm is different. The way you ask a question. And there's a lot more words. Pick up a thesaurus sometime. You've got to see how many different words there are for _red_."

Silence, from his friends. Across the infirmary, Kou was snickering.

"You know what a thesaurus is?" Aya said in disbelief.

"Yeah."

"Then _why do you act like an idiot in school?_" Brandishing her shinai, Aya radiated fury.

"Nothing to worry about!" Kou said hastily when Dr. Fraiser moved to head their way. "They're just complaining about homework. You know kids…."

Akira barely glanced at the doctor, saving his worry for the dark statue of a Jaffa observing them from a chair near the door. Even if his eyes hadn't been able to pick out the shifting in Teal'c's shadow when the larva moved, that symbol….

_First Prime of Apophis. _

Did the SGC have any idea what that meant? Did they know what this man must have done, to gain such favor in the eyes of the Goa'uld? Or worse - did they know, and just not care?

_They're allied with some Goa'uld. Who call themselves Tok'ra. Who knows? _

Shirogane would find out. He was sure of it. "I've told you. School is boring."

Aya got a calculating look in her eye, and he knew he was doomed. "Fine. Then why don't you teach us?"

"What?"

"School's boring, so you want more of it?" Kengo gave her a wounded look. "What kind of sense is that?"

"What if these people get in trouble again, and Akira and Kou can't translate for us?" Aya shot back. "I'm not saying make it like school. Just practice _talking_. People speak English all over the world! What if we end up somewhere _else_ where there's trouble?"

"…Huh."

Oh no. No, no, no; Kengo was looking _thoughtful_, and that was never a good thing. "You didn't seem surprised," Akira said quickly. "That I was a shin again."

"Well, we were when Master told us," Aya admitted. "He said that last battle with Homurabi injured you, and - Shirogane didn't want to get anyone's hopes up."

"I think Kou knew," Kengo frowned. "He's been all 'I've got a _secret_' for weeks."

"So it wasn't just me." That made Akira feel better. A little. "Shirogane says… shin and rei can seal their powers. Live as regular people."

"Okay. So?" Kengo blinked, confused.

Aya caught on, and gave him an evil eye. "Akira…."

"I'm _not_ running." Akira met her gaze. "But… my mother's not going to be happy, no matter what happens. You and Kengo, though, your families-"

"My family would only get mad if I ran from a fight I could _win_," Aya said fiercely.

"And Nee-chan's always going to attract dark energy," Kengo shrugged. "Better to go after the kokuchi than to keep throwing salt on her and hoping it works, huh?"

Was it possible to feel relieved and even more worried at the same time? "Just - be sure," Akira said bluntly. "Homurabi was bad. Goa'uld are worse."

Aya swallowed. "Worse?"

"They're parasites." Akira reached for glimmering shards of memory, trying not to flinch at the ripples of shock and horror and _anger_ that came with them. And with the emotions, names. _Shirogane_ whispered from many, but also _Sherit, Mery, Panefer, Solomon…._

_Other shin. Those who wove their memory into the shadows. _

He could almost reach out and touch how it had been done. How shin of the past had created vast tapestries of knowledge in that other world, history even Homurabi hadn't dared destroy. Because despite all the preparation and sacrifice over the millennia, some Goa'uld _had_ survived on Earth - and not to know their signs was suicide.

"If you encounter them outside a body, they're like a snake, with four red eyes, about this long." Akira held his hands about a half-meter apart. "But you probably won't. They live inside people. Control them. You can see them in people's shadows, squeezing…." He winced. "They're horrible. And I don't think Shirogane believes these Tok'ra are any better. I wouldn't. Not without a _lot_ of proof."

And it wasn't his imagination. Teal'c was paying very close attention to them; had been, since he'd said _Goa'uld_.

_Could he speak Japanese? _

Better safe than sorry. "We'll tell you more after we get back," Akira said in an undertone. "I don't like this place. I don't want us here." _Even one of us who thinks he belongs here._

And just when had _us_ started to include Daniel?

_When I changed him. I've got to look after him, the way Shirogane did for me._ Akira felt at that nervous sense of Daniel, so unlike Shirogane's cool focus, and sighed. _At least until he gets over being afraid of the shadows. We're not alien. Just different._

So. How could he get the archaeologist past that first, completely reasonable impulse to run?

_History. He wants to know about the uprising against Ra. And we can tell him._

Which mean the real question was, how much did Shirogane think he should know?

------------

"So there's been a vowel shift since the 'Gate was shut, and they've simplified a few consonants…."

Interesting as it was to compare Ancient Egyptian to Abydonian, Daniel could see Catherine getting more and more twitchy, keeping herself from pacing the disused office with an effort of will. _Wait_, he tried to tell her with a look. _They're stalling for a reason._

At least, he hoped they were. He couldn't keep from eyeing corners of the room, himself. He _knew_ Jack, there had to be cameras in here _somewhere_-

And Shuichi and Shirogane made a paired motion, rippling blue light and red shadow. "That should do," Shuichi said firmly. "We can speak freely now. The cameras are recording… well, more of the same."

"How?" Catherine challenged, before Daniel could.

"Ask Akira about simulacra, sometime." Shirogane smiled, full of mischief. "What we did was similar. And it will seem quite real."

_If he finds out, Jack's going to kill us_, Daniel thought wryly.

_If_ he found out. And on that note…. "Sam's design for her shadow-trap," he said in a rush, handing the pile of circuit-scribbles over to Shirogane. "If you're right, she might not even remember how to rebuild this. I kind of hope not."

Blue eyes regarded him soberly. "Why?"

"She almost killed me," Daniel said, shuddering. "Sam knows me, and she still almost killed me. And Akira. And if someone rebuilt that thing, and got you all in the same place, like you are _right now_…." He couldn't say it. "You, Akira - you came to help us. You didn't ask for anything, you didn't want anything; you knew there was a problem and you came to fix it. Knowing you could get hurt." He shook his head. "Do you have any idea how long it's been since _anyone_ did that for the SGC?"

Another, slower smile; this one reached blue eyes. "Thank you, Dr. Jackson."

"Thank _him_, certainly," Catherine said, eyes narrowed. "How could you bring Akira into such danger?"

"He chose to come," Shirogane answered. "He has a generous heart, Miss Catherine. I told him what I knew of what I might face, and he would not let me go alone."

"And the next king of the shin," Daniel put in, risking it all, "has to know what kind of dangers his people face."

Silence. Broken by Catherine's, _"What?"_

"You haven't spoken of this to Akira." Shuichi's level tone wasn't a question.

"I didn't really figure it out until a little while ago," Daniel said sheepishly. When he'd been in the middle of writing his report, winding down from _holy cow, I'm not dead_ to step back and _think_ about the shards of a new society he'd seen.

_A culture that grows by adopting people, not just birth. There's got to be some pretty intense pressure on individuals to keep it together. A shared enemy in the kokuchi helps; a shared purpose, keeping the worlds intact, helps more. And that bond, that Lulu called a contract…. _

Even so, if there were supposed to be two kings of the shin - Shirogane had to find someone more invested in shin society than the culture he'd been adopted from. Someone with both the ability to care _and_ the Jack-style grit to be a good leader. Someone willing to devote his life to a cause the rest of the world wouldn't even realize existed.

_Akira._

"I just added things up," Daniel shrugged. "Especially the way he treats the two of you-" Oh. _Oh._ Oh, boy.

"Daniel?" Catherine glanced his way, worried.

"The king of the rei," Daniel said slowly, meeting that blind gaze, "is hidden." He swallowed. "So what do I call you?"

"Shuichi will do," the blind rei said graciously. "Well reasoned. We're lucky to have you among us."

"Colonel O'Neill won't be pleased by this," Catherine warned. Saw Shirogane's bland look, and seemed to slump. "So. This… change, cannot be undone."

"No," Shirogane said honestly. "A shin can live as a human, and act as one - but I don't think Akira will. He cares too deeply to let innocents be harmed when he can stop it. And… he finds great joy with us, Miss Catherine. He was a blade left idle to rust. With us, he is _needed_." His voice dropped. "And we do need him. We need him desperately."

"King?" Catherine said pointedly.

"Shin and rei each have a direct king, who embodies shadows or light, and a king, who supports the direct king," Shuichi answered. "Shirogane is the direct king of the shadows; the direct king of light has not yet been reborn. But when he is, the shin will need a second king. And I, too, hope Akira will choose to take up that burden. I trust him." A soft laugh. "Though I'm just as glad we should have a few decades before we need worry about that. Akira could use some time just to be with family. Even one as eccentric as ours."

If he hadn't dealt so much with the Tok'ra, Daniel might have missed it. But the way Shuichi said _a few decades_, like most people would _a few months_…. "How long do shin live?"

A silent glance between the two. "We tend not to die, unless something kills us," Shirogane said plainly.

And facts tumbled together into one undeniable certainty. "That's why you had him disappear in the middle of NORAD," Daniel realized. "You're trying to get him to break off his normal life."

"Really, Dr. Jackson-"

"He's caught you fairly, old friend." Shuichi smiled wryly. "Yes. We are. Think. It might take longer if he were older, but the same problem would arise eventually. In two years, those who know him will start to wonder. In five, even his mother may notice. And if someone official is among those who determine the truth - we're powerful, but we're far from invulnerable. As you have seen. Better to live quietly in the shadows of your world, where no one cares overmuch if your birth certificate is real."

"I don't understand." But the wide-eyed shock on Catherine's face said she did, all too well.

"I'm guessing _live as a human_ also means grow old and _die_ as a human." Daniel licked his lips, recalling what Jack had said he suspected about Shirogane. "You… you saw the 'Gate buried, didn't you?"

"I did," Shirogane nodded. "And I once walked on Abydos, seeking to rescue those of our kin who had been taken. For most, I was too late. But not all."

"I need to sit down," Catherine murmured.

"Miss Catherine?" For once, there wasn't a trace of mischief in Shirogane's tone. Just honest worry.

"I'm an old woman, gentlemen," Catherine said plainly. "I always knew he'd outlive me, but-" A seated, wry shrug.

"Not so old, kinswoman," Shuichi said generously. Reached out, and laid a hand gently over hers. "Certainly not too old. If you wish it so."

Catherine looked up, and her wondering gaze was full of stars.

------------

"She looks happy," Jack observed, watching Catherine share lunch and languages with the oddball crew of shin, rei, and kids. And watching the other SGC personnel watch them. _Not_ with the kind of tolerant wariness they gave the Tok'ra. His fellow airmen and scientists seemed to have taken to the shadow-walkers like any other group of SGC newbies. And was that good thing, or a bad one? "A little too happy, for someone who just found out her cousin's risking his life against the forces of darkness."

"Forces of darkness?" Daniel murmured, giving him a _look_.

Okay, so maybe that was a little over the top. Just a little. "Shadow monsters. What else are we going to call them?"

"Kokuchi works fine." Daniel glanced at one of the two silent people sharing their table; the one who usually _wasn't_ silent. "Sam? Are you okay?"

"Am _I_ okay?" Sam burst out. Lowered her voice, at some of the glances from other SGC people grabbing lunch. "Daniel, I almost-" She couldn't say it.

Daniel looked a little pale at the reminder, but swallowed, and shook his head. "But you didn't. It's like being drugged, Sam. Akira doesn't blame you for what happened."

The astrophysicist gave him an incredulous look.

"He doesn't want to be within twenty feet of you and weird-looking circuitry," the archaeologist acknowledged, "but he doesn't _blame_ you." Daniel smiled ruefully. "Of course, Akira's also feeling just a little guilty about the biting. I don't think he likes to hit girls."

"Hey! I am _not_ a-" Sam saw the glint of mischief behind the glasses, and tight guilt and indignation relaxed into a more normal post-mission down. "I'm sorry, Daniel. I didn't mean to - I never would have - done that. If I'd been thinking straight."

"I know." And if Daniel's smile was still a little shadowed, nobody here was going to bring it up. "Maybe you should tell Akira that."

"You're right." Sam took a last bite of lunch, and stood. "I'll be back."

"Think Shirogane's going to bite her head off?" Jack said in an undertone after she was on her way.

"I think he's going to be _very_ polite." There was an uncharacteristic edge in Daniel's voice. "Which is going to make Sam feel even worse. Which is exactly what she feels like she deserves."

"And what is it you believe that she deserves, Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked.

"She almost killed me." Daniel let the words fall between them like stones. "Ask me again in a few days." _When I'm not so angry_, tense muscles shouted.

"I kind of recall somebody holding a gun on me, once," Jack said casually.

"On _you_, Jack. _Not_ on the whole SGC. What she whipped up almost turned the whole Mountain inside-out." Daniel took a deliberate breath. "Do you think you could ask General Hammond to put a few more safety precautions on alien artifacts? So nobody has more than a few pieces of tech in one place at one time? That was… really not fun."

And here was Dr. Jackson, offering to make his own job more tedious and full of paperwork, just so the SGC wouldn't get in hot water that way again. Who said scientists couldn't be practical? "I'll put it on my wish list," Jack said matter-of-factly. "right after better security on the armory."

"It would be wise," Teal'c said dryly.

Okay. So this hadn't exactly been the SGC's finest hour. "Not like we deal with things that walk through walls every day," Jack grumbled.

"No," Daniel said with angelic innocence, "the Tollans haven't visited for _months_."

There was a perfect, biting retort to that, and Jack was going to deliver it unto one snarky archaeologist. Just as soon as he figured out what it was. "So when are they fixing it so you don't go see-through?"

"I… don't really plan to get anything fixed."

"Are you out of your _mind?_"

Okay, so their table was getting a lot of weird looks today. Jack glared until the rubberneckers found their lunch fascinating again, then glanced at one idiot archaeologist. "Look. I know you'd like to help out the kids, but we need you here. _Not_ off chasing shadow-monsters."

"The kokuchi are going to come after me whether I'm a shin or not," Daniel said steadily. "And don't say they never came before. We never shredded the fabric of reality here before, either. Shirogane and Shuichi have patched the worst tears, but we're going to have small ones showing up for a long, long time. We need a shin _here_. It might as well be me."

For someone supposedly making the best of a bad situation, Jack thought, Daniel looked entirely too cheerful.

"And they've got a library," the archaeologist went on, with the kind of reverence most people reserved for the Hall of Fame. "Historical sources on the rebellion, Jack. Some of them written as it was happening. Don't you want to know what kind of tactics the System Lords have seen before? What they might be expecting? What they never saw coming?"

"Sure. Who wouldn't? But you don't have to do this," Jack argued.

"I know." Blue eyes were sober. "That's why I want to."

"You're talking about being a _living shadow_ for the rest of your life," Jack pointed out. "Isn't that just a _little_ creepy?" He glanced at Teal'c. "Help me out here, T."

"If this line of warriors defeated the forces of Ra on Earth, we are obligated to assist them," Teal'c stated. "I, too, wish to learn of the rebellion."

Sometimes he forgot just how much non-military education was hiding under the Jaffa warrior inscrutability. "Doesn't anybody else think this is creepy?" Jack grumbled.

"I was hoping you wouldn't," Daniel said neutrally. "I thought you might like to talk to Akira. About being a shin. And other things."

"And I'd want to do this, why?" Jack asked dryly.

Daniel looked back at him, and shook his head. "Because he's a lot like _you_."

_Voice down_, Jack reminded himself. _We've used up our quota of weird looks for the day. Keep this up, and next week nobody in the SGC will blink if we come back from a mission wearing tutus. Which should be a warning sign for anybody_. "Not a chance."

"He's smart," Daniel ticked off on his fingers, "but he'd rather be up and moving than parked with a book that's not interesting. He thinks at things sideways, which solves a lot of problems, but he's not afraid to wade in with force when that's what it takes. He's tough that way; maybe after the fight he gets a little shaky, but while he's in it, he's in it to _win_. And he worries about his people. All the time."

Jack frowned, glancing over at their visitors' table, where an apologetic Sam was apparently being handled with no-nonsense iron inside the velvet glove of genteel manners. Most of the SGC's anthropology people probably couldn't come within swinging distance of picking out who might be officer material, studies of tribal hierarchy or not. But this was Daniel. "What other things?"

"Well," Daniel said judiciously, "you could start with why _you_ think Teal'c is one of the good guys."

Teal'c raised an eyebrow.

"He trusts you," Jack pointed out.

"And I can tell him Teal'c is my friend, and I trust him, and I know what he's done for the SGC," Daniel said matter-of-factly. "But I _can't_ tell him why, _tactically_, trusting Teal'c is a good idea." Behind glass, blue eyes were sober. "Jack, I've seen Akira fight. When he jumps into a mess, he's _already thought out_ what he's going to do. Every move he makes, hits. Or keeps somebody from _being_ hit." Daniel's fingers grazed the tabletop, as if he could drag the right words out of thin air. "I don't even know what I'm trying to describe-"

"Situational awareness," Jack said thoughtfully, thinking back to that last battle in the 'Gateroom. Shirogane had been injured over _there_, and Akira had come out-

_Not_ beside the shin king. A little away, right where the biggest knot of kokuchi would have to go _through_ him to take Shirogane. And the rest of the fight… well, Jack had been way too busy himself to keep track of everybody. But what he did remember, rang right.

_Akira was reading the battlefield, the whole time. And he made the right calls doing it._

Meaning Daniel was right. Akira would be thinking about Teal'c - and SG-1, and the whole SGC - in ways even a battle-tested archaeologist wouldn't intuitively grasp. Though Danny at least knew what he _didn't_ know. "How's his English?" Jack said abruptly.

"Ah… Catherine says he's good. Why?"

Jack smirked. "Kid's bored in school, right? I'm gonna give him a reading list." He grinned at the archaeologist. "I think we'll start with the Peloponnesian War."

------------

"I knew he liked books more than he let on," Daniel muttered to himself, amused.

Leaning against a wall in the archaeologist's artifact-strewn office as he looked over a very long list with Shirogane, Akira shook his head. "I'm not a soldier."

"But knowing how one fights is never wasted knowledge," Shirogane said plainly. "Especially if - forgive me for saying it, Dr. Jackson - something goes very wrong here."

"You mean, if we lose," Daniel said soberly. "I know. I don't like to think about it, but - I know. We've come close, a couple of times." He swallowed dryly. "I mean, first and last line of defense sounds pretty noble and heroic. But when you lose… people important to you… heroic sounds like just another word for _stupid_."

_He lost someone._ Akira felt the grief aching off the man, mixed with enough guilt and weariness to crush the breath from his lungs. _No one should hurt like that_.

"So you have nowhere left to go," Shirogane murmured.

Daniel shot a look his way, anger sparking in blue eyes. And slowly dying. "I can't go back to Abydos. Not for more than visits. They need me here."

"And what do _you_ need?" Akira challenged.

Deer in headlights, Daniel stared at him.

_Did I look like that, when Shirogane asked me what I wanted?_ "Abydos is across the galaxy," Akira pointed out. "You can't get there. You _can_ get to Japan. Or Aunt Catherine's." He smiled, just a little. "She'd be glad to see you. So would we."

"And a university degree in America," Shirogane observed, "might stall your mother quite neatly, until you can offer her a worthy alternative to a lawyer's life." At Akira's look askance, he smiled, all mischief again. "It's good to have options."

Right. Unless he wanted to follow Kou's example and spend a lot of time dodging Yakuza, he'd better have _some_ kind of legal job.

"But more hopeful plans aside," Shirogane went on, "if you believe the only way things might go wrong here is by _losing_, Dr. Jackson…." He shook his head.

"We lose, Earth dies. Or gets enslaved," Daniel pointed out.

"And under what conditions will you win?" Shirogane arched a brow. "Do you know what happened to the Knights Templar?"

"…No."

Shirogane held out a hand. "Come, then, and see."

"Don't you mean read?" Daniel said warily.

"No." Shirogane glanced at Akira. "It won't be pleasant."

"I know," Akira said honestly. He could feel those shards of memory, bloody and grieving. "Let's go."

One on either side, they stole Daniel away into the shadows.

_Deep. Deeper than I've ever gone. _

A black-and-white chessboard of ground, massive marble and obsidian pillars rising in rows as far as the eye could see. Between them billowed tapestries of shadow; flickers of images, voices, feelings.

"This is our history, Dr. Jackson." Shirogane looked over the shadows with sad determination. "I have added to it my whole reign, and soon I will teach Akira to record here as well. And this-" he gestured to a waft of shadow, beckoning it to billow near them "-is what you should see."

_King Phillip's soldiers-_

_They took my friend, Jehan-_

_They've raided the monasteries-_

_Not a Templar free in France-_

_Heresy? Devil-worship? Impossible; we_ know _these men-_

_The Pope won't defend them. The_ Pope, _when they've protected the faithful from evil for centuries!_

_Save who you can-_

_Most won't come. They think we're demons; they think their church must exonerate them-_

_Oh god, the_ fires-

Akira pulled back from the memories, eyes wet. Beside him, he heard Daniel weeping.

"It's over," Shirogane said softly. "There's nothing you can do. It was over a long time ago." He sighed, just as quiet. "Say _alliance with aliens_, rather than _deals with demons_, Dr. Jackson… history does not always predict the future, but only a fool ignores its warnings."

Shaking, Daniel wiped the tears from his face. Swallowed. "Will Catherine… see this?"

"And more," Shirogane said gravely. "The history kept by the rei is theirs, as that of the shin is ours, but we have both had kin in history's darker moments."

"They wouldn't do that to the SGC-" Daniel stopped. Winced, face pale. "Stupid. Humans are naturally xenophobic. It's a defense mechanism. Stranger equals someone you don't know, who might not feel obligated to abide by your laws. And the Tok'ra _don't_. They want us to play by their rules, but they only stick to ours when it's _convenient_."

"They are," Shirogane said with devastating mildness, "Egeria's children."

"…You've got memories like this of her, too."

"And other System Lords," Akira admitted. "It was awful." Knuckles whitened; he forced his fists to unclench. "We _won't_ let that happen again."

Daniel swallowed hard, and straightened. "I'm in."

"I know." Shirogane's smile was warm and welcoming, with just a touch of dark mischief. "We've known since you brought us Sam's plans."

_We have?_ Akira tried not to look surprised. Whatever Shirogane's plan was, he was not going to screw it up.

"But they're my friends," Daniel said thickly.

"So maybe you'll get lucky, and never have to choose," Akira stated. "But there's a difference between being where someone needs you to be, and being where _you_ need to be." _Always coming home to an empty house, because my mother doesn't want me anywhere else…._

Shirogane's hand rested warm comfort on his shoulder. "We should bring you back, before you're missed."

"Probably too late," Daniel said wryly. "Odds are Jack walked in right after we left, he's got awful timing that way… wait. Me? What about you?"

"Shuichi and the others are already gone," Shirogane said innocently. "And we have… other places to be."

Daniel groaned, head in his hands. Sighed. "You realize, for Jack, this means war."

Akira smirked. "He's got to catch us first."

A snort of laughter, and Daniel fell back into step with them again. But he hesitated, right before shadows would have revealed his office. "Akira? You know, that offer goes both ways. If I'm on the planet, if you need to talk-"

"I know who to call."

Smiling, Daniel stepped into the light.

"Alone at last," Shirogane sighed, eyes twinkling.

Akira clapped a hand to his forehead in disbelief. "You never quit."

"Well… your mother's not _really_ expecting you to show up for another few days, is she?"

_"Shirogane!" _

Silver laughter danced through the shadows.

------------

"We need to give you a bell," Jack said dryly.

Eyeing startled security guards in his office, none of whom had apparently seen him before he used his doppleganger, Daniel sighed. And pointedly turned his attention toward the reason there were wide-eyed airmen in his office. "Wouldn't work. If they can't see a shin, they can't hear a bell he's wearing, either. Jack, _why?_"

"You took a walk."

"And? So?" Daniel said pointedly.

"So did everybody else."

"Ah. Yeah. Shirogane did say they'd already left." At Jack's frown, Daniel added, "When we were coming back from the library, Jack, I got back as soon as I could."

"The General's not happy."

"No," Daniel allowed, "I guess he wouldn't be-"

"_I'm_ not happy." Jack looked at him askance. "We can't just have people popping in and out of here whenever they feel like it… what?"

"Oh, just waiting for Thor to beam you up," Daniel said innocently.

"Funny. Very funny."

"They don't want to get involved with the government, Jack," Daniel said plainly. "If they'd stayed long enough for us to _officially_ figure out what to do with them - well, think of the paperwork. I'm not even sure Shirogane _has_ a native country. Wherever he was born doesn't even exist anymore."

"Not the point," Jack stated, nodding the guards out. "We need to know they're on our side."

"Oh, that's easy." Daniel waited until the door was safely closed. "They're not."

The look Jack turned on him was dark, and definitely not laughing.

"If they were _officially_ on our side, we'd lose our alliance with the Tok'ra," Daniel said bluntly. "They _do not trust_ Egeria's children. And I think they've got good reasons."

Jack looked interested, but not mollified. "You've seen the library."

"Part of it," Daniel allowed. If you could call a weave of captured memories a library. _And I was wondering how they passed their culture to adoptees… gods. _"What I saw - Jack, they don't take sides in human wars. They take care of the boundary, and of their people - and if it gets too hairy, they _leave_."

"Running doesn't solve anything," Jack said flatly.

Incredulous, Daniel looked at him. Held up three fingers, and curled each one down with a name. "Shirogane. Lulu. Akira. Exactly _who_ do you think they can afford to risk losing in our war?"

"_Our_ war?" Jack said, just as dryly. "Earth goes, they go."

"Probably," Daniel allowed. "But think of it this way, Jack. If they're not officially allied with us, if we _don't_ have paperwork on hand that says who, how, and when they show up - what happens the next time somebody tries to take over the SGC?"

Jack closed he jaw, and thought about that. "Okay, point," he admitted at last. "Unexpected guests can cut both ways. I still don't like it."

"Why not?" Daniel asked, honestly curious. "What makes the shin dropping in any different from the Asgard? We don't have a formal alliance with them, either."

"They gave up a lot to take us under the Treaty," Jack objected.

"And Shirogane and Akira _risked their lives_," Daniel pointed out. "What makes what they did worth less, Jack? Really. I want to know."

"You want honest? Fine." Jack crossed his arms, glowering. "Thor never hurt you."

"He didn't?" Daniel laughed, quiet and bitter. "You really didn't read the background material for the negotiations."

"Hey, there was a lot of it-"

"The Asgard had a say in which System Lords showed up. They could have asked for Amaunet to come." Daniel swallowed, fighting the black misery of that long-ago realization. "I could have had a chance to save her."

"And if you'd done that, Earth would be-" Jack cut himself off, lips pressed into a thin, grim line.

_In the middle of a war? We already_ are. _I just wanted Sha'uri_ back…. "And if it was Sarah?" Daniel said bluntly. "Would you have just _followed orders_, Jack?"

"Danny…."

"Never mind," Daniel said quietly. "Sha'uri's dead. I tried. It wasn't enough." He looked back up at Jack. "But Sam is alive. And it cost Akira a lot to get her back."

"Fine. So they're good guys." Jack didn't look happy admitting it. "I still don't trust them." He sighed. "But I trust you. Just be careful, okay?"

There were a multitude of answers Daniel wanted to give to that, but sarcasm would only escalate the situation. "I will."

Jack gave him a curious look, but shrugged, and headed for the door. "Think I need to talk to the general about how we write this one up…."

Alone in his office, Daniel pondered the corners of the room. _I wonder how many cameras Jack put in?_

It wasn't that he didn't trust Jack. Trusting Colonel O'Neill, though; that was trickier.

_I can see his point. Kind of. The shin are a security threat. But so are the Asgard. We've only got their word that they aren't using what they know against Earth. Or letting someone else see it who would.  
_

Put that together with the uncanny resemblance of the Asgard to creatures described by people absolutely convinced they'd been abducted by aliens - well.

But that wasn't what made Daniel leery of leaning on the goodwill of the Asgard. Not really.

_Cimmeria. _

They'd been under the Protected Planets Treaty, too. Which hadn't stopped Heru'ur from moving right in and massacring people as soon as he'd proved Thor's Hammer was broken.

_Asgard equipment. Didn't they keep an eye on it? A beacon, an alarm - heck, a sensor to say the maze exit got buried by an avalanche, so freed hosts can't get out? There was an Unas in there, for gods' sakes! How many hosts didn't get as lucky as Kendra?_

And in the end, she hadn't gotten lucky at all. He only hoped Heru'ur's men had killed her quickly.

If the shin and rei had looked after the boundary the way the Asgard had Cimmeria, the SGC would have been a smoking hole in the mountain.

_But I don't think Jack wants to see that. He and Thor are buddies. _

Which _still_ didn't make sense, no matter how many different ways Daniel considered the situation. Sure, the Asgard had saved Jack by getting that Ancient database out of his head. And they'd done good things for the SGC since. Daniel might wish with all his heart that he'd had another chance to save Sha'uri, but he was grateful Earth had the Treaty's protection. However slim it might be.

Even so. Why buddies? He'd worked with Jack for years, and their friendship still had its rocky patches. Teal'c had a lot more in common with Jack as a fellow warrior, and it'd still taken months for the colonel to count him as completely reliable. Thor, Jack had only met a handful of times.

_It just doesn't make sense. _

In his experience with the SGC, when something didn't make sense, everything was about to go drastically wrong.

_If there was just some way to get more information about the Asgard. Their culture, their intentions - are they really abducting people, or is it just what some psychologists think, a modern-day version of fairy visitations? But there's nowhere to-_

The library.

_The Asgard have been visiting Earth for over a thousand years. What are the odds that they_ haven't _run into a shin?_

Smiling grimly, Daniel started making notes. Ignoring the cameras, if cameras there were. There was something to be said for being the only person on the base who could really read Ancient Egyptian.

As for people off the base….

_I think I'd like to see Tokyo. Soon. _

-End

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Info:

_"En merer-er ari-ef, mest'et'-ef an ari-nef."_ - "What he wills, he does; what he hates, he doth not do." - from the Papyrus of Ani. Yes, I do use the Budge translation.

_"An khena-ten ba-a, an saa-ten khabit-a; un aat en ba-a, en khabit-a."_­ - "Let not be shut in my soul, let not be fettered my shadow; let be opened the way for my soul, and for my shadow."

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